India

The Refractive Error Among Children (REACH) project aims to reduce visual impairment due to uncorrected refractive error among school-going children and provide a sustainable and scalable solution to a shortage of care.

Orbis, along with our partners, develops teams of ophthalmic personnel and supports them with digital and clinical equipment to perform screenings in schools, and provide eyeglasses, as well as referrals for children who require further examination and treatment.

More than 19 million children from 21,000 schools have undergone screening as part of the REACH program in India, with 78% of those living in rural locations.

Read more about the design and delivery of our REACH program in India in this paper published in Taylor & Francis online.

This model has also been rolled out successfully in Bangladesh, Ghana, and Nepal.

In 2002, we launched the India Childhood Blindness Initiative to help ensure India’s children have access to quality eye care for generations to come. To date, 35 Children’s Eye Centers have been developed across 17 states.

We launched the India Childhood Blindness Initiative (ICBI), our flagship program in 2002, to help ensure that India’s children across geographies have access to quality eye care for generations to come. To date, 32 Children’s Eye Centers have been developed across 17 states of the country.

This is the largest network of Children’s Eye Centers in the world. As part of this, we contributed to the development of pediatric ophthalmology as a distinct sub-specialty in the Indian ophthalmology landscape. Our work has also been instrumental in creating and promoting the idea of a pediatric ophthalmology team. This team goes beyond the boundaries of the CEC to work closely with a network of community organizations and volunteers.

Thanks to Orbis donors and the support of our local partners we have a number of key ongoing projects, that will help provide access to quality eye care for millions of people.

• Comprehensive childhood blindness projects - Akhand Jyoti Eye Hospital and Sitapur Eye Hospital
• Target of launching 100 green vision centers by 2025
• Access to pediatric eye care services in Bihar
• Refractive Error Among Children (REACH) projects with four partners
• Regional training centers on patient communication
• Validity and effectiveness of a virtual reality simulator for manual small incision cataract surgery