There are 300,000 adults and 23,000 children in Vietnam who are blind. While blindness in Vietnam has decreased over the last decade, the country continues to struggle with providing eye care, especially in rural areas. Quality of care, training and human resources still remain problematic, and overall awareness of how to prevent blindness is low.
In school, Hoa’s classmates mocked the appearance of her eyes, calling her “squinter”. Her schoolwork suffered because she couldn’t see clearly. See how Orbis helped to make Hoa’s magic wish come true.
We began collaborating with Vietnam’s ophthalmic communities through hospital-based projects in 1996. A permanent office was established in Hanoi in 2003.
Orbis has been providing the highest level of expertise to support the development of eye care services and blindness prevention in Vietnam – especially in the areas of retinopathy of prematurity (ROP), pediatric and cataract services and in establishing an eye bank.
In 2020 alone, we delivered:
In 2010 Dr. Black, a pediatric ophthalmologist from New Orleans, Louisiana, treated eight-year-old Quang Chien for strabismus. Find out what happened when Dr Black returned to see her again.
Orbis plans to address the constraints of eye care system in Vietnam through three key strategies: expanding quality pediatric eye care services in more regions across the country; strengthening human resources for eye health; and increasing the availability of eye care services for diabetic patients.
Our work includes developing models to ensure quality of care and quality of human resources that can be replicated and maintained by the government. The first model reflecting international standards for diabetic retinopathy – which poses a risk to four million people with diabetes in Vietnam – is in the pilot stage and requires further resources to be replicated nationwide.
With your support we can continue reforming ophthalmic education in Vietnam and advocating for eye health to become a priority on the public health agenda.
