when will be the visit to india and where? Can we go to visit this hospital
only? Please share if you have any idea regarding it.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Rahul Kelapure" <rkelap...@gmail.com>
To: "accessindia" <accessindia@accessindia.org.in>
Sent: Saturday, September 12, 2009 12:32 PM
Subject: [AI] World's only flying eye hospital
World's only flying eye hospital
By Michelle Roberts
Health reporter, BBC News
On approaching the flying eye hospital, it looks like any of the other
passenger jets on the runway waiting to take holidaymakers to exotic
destinations.
But this DC-10 jet is exceptional - it houses the only airborne
operating theatre for eye treatment in the world.
Its mission is to tackle avoidable sight loss and its charter reaches
developing countries where 90% of the world's 45 million blind people
live.
Next stop is India, a country that has one of the highest rates of
blindness among children - one in five of the world's blind children
is Indian.
Hospital with wings
The flying eye hospital was the vision of one man, Dr David Paton, an
eminent eye surgeon at the Baylor College of Medicine in Texas, US.
TREATABLE CONDITIONS
Cataract
Childhood blindness
Corneal blindness
Diabetic retinopathy
Glaucoma
Retinoblastoma
Retinopathy of prematurity
Strabismus
Trachoma
In the 1970s, while touring throughout the developing world, he was
shocked by the state of eye care services he found in these countries.
Although the doctors he met there wanted to learn the necessary skills
to cure blinding diseases like cataracts, glaucoma and retinoblastoma,
the costs and practicalities involved prevented it.
Dr Paton's solution was a mobile teaching hospital.
With a fully equipped plane, donated by United Airlines, doctors
trained in the latest ophthalmic techniques could bring their surgical
knowledge and skills to the doctors and patients in developing
countries.
The local doctors can then use their newly learned skills in their
homeland.
The first hospital with wings was launched in 1982, its maiden voyage
being to Panama.
Since then, the flying eye hospital has visited 75 countries and saved
the sight of tens of millions of people.
Scrub room
Once you board the aircraft, you enter a 48-seat classroom at the
front of the plane, where doctors gather in the passenger seats for
lectures and discussions, and to watch live broadcasts of surgical
procedures being performed in the nearby operating theatre on the
in-flight entertainment-style big screen.
As you walk down the main corridor towards its tail, the landscape
changes from aeroplane to hospital.
There is a waiting room, an examination room and a laser eye treatment
area.
Next, at the middle and most stable part of the craft, is a fully
equipped operating theatre with an adjoining scrub room where the
surgeons prepare.
The rear houses a peaceful yet cheery recovery room, with a row of
beds adorned with teddy bears, fluffy ducks and a toy piglet.
Its bowels, reached by a snug elevator for one, hold all the necessary
power generators, air filters and water system gadgetry that allows
the grounded hospital to function self-sufficiently for weeks on end
and in any location, even a desert.
The 21 crew members, including doctors, nurses and biomedical
engineers and flight mechanics, are flown from country to country for
up to 10 months of the year by United Airline pilots who volunteer
their services.
Onboard operations manager John Kona said: "It is a really tough
schedule and it takes dedication.
"You are away from your friends and family for all but two months of
the year, living out of a suitcase and working seven days a week.
REGIONS VISITED
Africa
Bangladesh
China
India
Latin America and the Caribbean
Vietnam
"But when you see the smile on the faces of the children you help, all
of that just melts away."
One of the millions of children the ORBIS flying eye hospital team
have helped is three-year-old Richard Mwaluko from Dar es Salaam,
Tanzania.
At six months of age he was diagnosed with a rare type of squint, a
condition that causes his eyes to turn in the wrong direction.
Richard's mother, Mary, knew there was little she could do about her
son's condition because she had no money or connections.
Richard did not look like other children and, as he grew older, began
to feel insecure because he was different.
Mary was afraid Richard would grow up ridiculed by others and she
decided to make the difficult journey to a far away hospital to seek
help.
She arrived at the hospital only to be told that they could not treat
Richard's condition, and that without treatment he could lose the
sight in that eye.
But hope was not lost as the doctor mentioned that the flying eye
hospital was due to visit Dar es Salaam.
The operation on the aircraft was a success and although Richard will
need follow-up surgery in the future, he can expect a life with good
vision.
--
Rahul Kelapure
(ADVOCATE)
+919811650159
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