Ophthalmology is a clinical and surgical specialty within medicine that deals with the diagnosis and treatment of eye disorders. A former term is oculism.
A cataract is a cloudy area in the lens of the eye that leads to a decrease in vision of the eye. Cataracts often develop slowly and can affect one or both eyes. Symptoms may include faded colours, blurry or double vision, halos around light, trouble with bright lights, and difficulty seeing at night. This may result in trouble driving, reading, or recognizing faces. Poor vision caused by cataracts may also result in an increased risk of falling and depression. Cataracts cause 51% of all cases of blindness and 33% of visual impairment worldwide.
Far-sightedness, also known as long-sightedness, hypermetropia, and hyperopia, is a condition of the eye where distant objects are seen clearly but near objects appear blurred. This blur is due to incoming light being focused behind, instead of on, the retina due to insufficient accommodation by the lens. Minor hypermetropia in young patients is usually corrected by their accommodation, without any defects in vision. But, due to this accommodative effort for distant vision, people may complain of eye strain during prolonged reading. If the hypermetropia is high, there will be defective vision for both distance and near. People may also experience accommodative dysfunction, binocular dysfunction, amblyopia, and strabismus. Newborns are almost invariably hypermetropic, but it gradually decreases as the newborn gets older.
Phacoemulsification is a cataract surgery method in which the internal lens of the eye which has developed a cataract is emulsified with the tip of an ultrasonic handpiece and aspirated from the eye. Aspirated fluids are replaced with irrigation of balanced salt solution to maintain the volume of the anterior chamber during the procedure. This procedure minimises the incision size and reduces the recovery time and risk of surgery induced astigmatism.
An Intraocular lens (IOL) is a lens implanted in the eye usually as part of a treatment for cataracts or for correcting other vision problems such as short sightedness and long sightedness; a form of refractive surgery. If the natural lens is left in the eye, the IOL is known as phakic, otherwise it is a pseudophakic lens. Both kinds of IOLs are designed to provide the same light-focusing function as the natural crystalline lens. This can be an alternative to LASIK, but LASIK is not an alternative to an IOL for treatment of cataracts.
Refractive error is a problem with focusing light accurately on the retina due to the shape of the eye and/or cornea. The most common types of refractive error are near-sightedness, far-sightedness, astigmatism, and presbyopia. Near-sightedness results in far away objects being blurry, far-sightedness and presbyopia result in close objects being blurry, and astigmatism causes objects to appear stretched out or blurry. Other symptoms may include double vision, headaches, and eye strain.
Cataract surgery, also called lens replacement surgery, is the removal of the natural lens of the eye that has developed a cataract, an opaque or cloudy area. The eye's natural lens is usually replaced with an artificial intraocular lens (IOL) implant.
Astigmatism is a type of refractive error due to rotational asymmetry in the eye's refractive power. This results in distorted or blurred vision at any distance. Other symptoms can include eyestrain, headaches, and trouble driving at night. Astigmatism often occurs at birth and can change or develop later in life. If it occurs in early life and is left untreated, it may result in amblyopia.
Patricia Era Bath was an American ophthalmologist and humanitarian. She became the first female member of the Jules Stein Eye Institute, the first woman to lead a post-graduate training program in ophthalmology, and the first woman elected to the honorary staff of the UCLA Medical Center. Bath was the first African-American to serve as a resident in ophthalmology at New York University. She was also the first African-American woman to serve on staff as a surgeon at the UCLA Medical Center. Bath was the first African-American woman doctor to receive a patent for a medical purpose. A holder of five patents, she founded the non-profit American Institute for the Prevention of Blindness in Washington, D.C.
Aravind Eye Hospitals is a hospital chain in India. It was founded by Dr. Govindappa Venkataswamy at Madurai, Tamil Nadu in 1976. It has grown into a network of eye hospitals and has had a major impact in eradicating cataract related blindness in India. As of 2012, Aravind has treated nearly 32 million patients and performed 4 million surgeries. The model of Aravind Eye Care hospitals has been applauded and has become a subject for numerous case studies across the world.
Govindappa Venkataswamy, popularly known as Dr V., was an Indian ophthalmologist who dedicated his life to eliminate needless blindness. He was the founder and former chairman of Aravind Eye Hospitals. He is best known for developing a high quality, high volume, low-cost service delivery model that has restored sight to millions of people. Since inception, Aravind Eye Care System has seen over 55 million patients, and performed over 6.8 million surgeries. Over 50% of the organisation's patients pay either nothing or highly subsidised rates. Its scale and self-sustainability prompted a 1993 Harvard Business Case Study on the Aravind model.
Al-Basar International Foundation is a non-profit international NGO based in Saudi Arabia. It was established in 1989 to work in the field of prevention and eradication/controlling of blindness & blinding diseases.
Layton Rahmatullah Benevolent Trust or LRBT is Pakistan's largest non-governmental organisation, working to fight blindness in the country. It is assumed to be not only the largest eye provider in the country but also the largest eye care provider in the world to have treated over 54 million patients in 38 years. The organization treats 10,200 OPD patients every single day. Established in 1984, it is based in Karachi with hospitals and primary eye care centers throughout the country.
Howard V. Gimbel FRCSC, AOE, FACS, CABES, is a Canadian ophthalmologist, university professor, senior editor, and amateur musician. He is better known for his invention, along with Thomas Neuhann, of the continuous curvilinear capsulorhexis (CCC), a technique employed in modern cataract surgery.
The Nasreen and Alam Sher Foundation, was started in February 2007, and is a United States-based organization with one major goal: to help those in need. Since its inception, the NASF has expanded in members and support worldwide. It is an organization run completely non-governmental, non-religious, non-political, and non-profit. Recognized by the United Nations, this organization was created to promote health, education, humanities, and peace in South Asian countries and beyond. The emphasis remains on human development, freedom, human rights, quality and equality of the lives of ordinary people.
Eric John Arnott, MA, FRCS, FRCOphth was a British ophthalmologist and surgeon who specialized in cataracts, a condition which in many parts of the world still remains the principal cause of blindness. He is known for inventing new surgical techniques for treatment of various ophthalmological disorders, and received professional awards for his contributions.
Sheraz Daya is a British ophthalmologist. Daya founded the Centre for Sight in 1996, and works in stem-cell research and sight restoration and correction surgery.
The Himalayan Cataract Project (HCP) was created in 1995 by Dr. Geoffrey Tabin and Dr. Sanduk Ruit with a goal of establishing a sustainable eye care infrastructure in the Himalaya. HCP empowers local doctors to provide ophthalmic care through skills-transfer and education. From its beginning, HCP responds to a pressing need for eye care in the Himalayan region. With programs in Nepal, Ethiopia, Ghana, Bhutan and India they have been able to restore sight to over 1.4 million people since 1995.
Bharti Kashyap Navigating Health Care Reform in Jharkhand From a crusader against blindness to Cervical cancer activist the extraordinary success and figures of cervical cancer eradication campaign, eye donation awareness campaign, diabetic retinopathy screening, “Jyot Se Jyot Jalao” campaign and vision protection campaign being run in Jharkhand over the past three decades by Dr. Bharti Kashyap is a testament to the fact that she has carried out the campaigns with full devotion and dedication and has successfully achieved the set targets. Nari Shakti puruskar Awardee Dr Bharti Kashyap is an Indian ophthalmologist and great family and child welfare social worker in Jharkhand, also known as vision and Janni suraksha Lady. She is honoured with Nari Shakti Puraskar in 2017 by hon'ble president of India and is a five-time recipient of the National IMA Award for the welfare of the underprivileged section of society
Clear lens extraction (CLE), also known as refractive lensectomy, custom lens replacement (CLR) or refractive lens exchange (RLE) is a surgical procedure in which clear lens of the human eye is removed. Unlike cataract surgery, where cloudy lens is removed to treat cataract, clear lens extraction is done to surgically correct refractive errors such as high myopia. It can also be done in hyperopic or presbyopic patients who wish to have a multifocal IOL implanted to avoid wearing glasses. It is also used as a treatment for diseases such as angle closure glaucoma.
