Sankara Eye Hospital, Bangalore has entered into a partnership with Geuder Asia Pacific, a wholly owned subsidiary of Geuder AG, to set up the Sankara Geuder Competence Centre to provide training to surgeons and paramedical staff in Phacoemulsification and Vitreoretinal Surgery. The centre will address the demand for trained eye-care professionals which is needed to handle India’s growing 12 million blind population.

According to Sankara Eye Hospital, annually India trains 900 ophthalmologists and 1,300 Mid-Level Ophthalmic Personnel (MLOP), but still has a long way to go towards the requirement of 25,000 ophthalmologists and 20,000 MLOPs by 2020.

The German-based, Geuder is one of the global leaders in manufacturing innovative ophthalmic instruments. The initiative is a first in Asia for Geuder A G to partner an ophthalmic care institution. Over the last six decades, it has partnered with many eye care institutions in Europe and North America. Ophthalmologists from over 90 countries rely on the 3,000 different Geuder products.

“Since ophthalmology is a specialized field which requires good surgeons and innovative instruments. Now Sankara Geuder Competence Centre will provide education and help eye surgeons to treat Cataract and Vitreoretinal diseases. The optimal application of Geuder’s advanced technology will help introduce novel surgical techniques for better patient outcomes at affordable costs without compromising on safety standards, stated Dr R V Ramani, founder & managing trustee, Sankara Eye Care Institutions.

The wet lab will provide practicing surgeons to upgrade their skills in micro-incision Cataract Surgery and suture-less Vitrectomy procedures. Besides, this training model will be replicated at other centres of Sankara Eye Care Institution. The Centre will also create an infrastructure to train the Biomedical Engineering field staff and paramedical staff. Besides, it would also be a hub to evaluate future technologies in clinical and surgical parameters.

“The new Centre is a step towards the Vision 20/20 for all by 2020, a project to benefit one million under-privileged population. We will train personnel from field workers to paramedical staff and ophthalmologists which is critical to eradicate preventable blindness, a condition which accounts for 90% of the total blindness. Currently, lack of awareness, poor service quality, shortage of trained surgeons, high treatment cost and poor accessibility have impacted quality eye care, he added.

According to Anil Kumar Nair, managing director, Geuder Asia Pacific, Sankara Eye Hospital’s surgical expertise and application of Geuder’s product features would spawn new surgical approaches and techniques which are fine tuned for Indian operating conditions.

Sankara Eye Care Institutions also conducts offers Fellowship, Clinical Observership and Research besides other paramedical courses. The Vitreoretinal fellowship is under the aegis of the Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences, Bangalore.

The centre was inaugurated by Dr A S Rathore, additional director, general ophthalmology, National Programme for Control of Blindness.