Our achievements in 2010

In 2010 The Fred Hollows Foundation International continued to restore sight, provide high quality medical training, and build and equip health care facilities in 29 countries around the world.  As a direct result hundreds of thousands of lives were transformed for the better.

Restoring sight

285 million people around the world are visually impaired - 39 million are blind and the remaining 246 million have low vision that severely impacts their everyday lives. 90 per cent of these people live in developing countries. These numbers can seem overwhelming, but our 2010 results are incredibly encouraging and we remain optimistic that we can make Fred’s vision a reality.

In 2010 alone we performed 194,903 eye operations and treatments. And we screened 1,310,226 people for a range of eye problems from cataracts through to glaucoma.

Medical training

Fred believed local people were best placed to deliver health care in their own communities. And we couldn’t agree more.

In 2010 The Foundation trained 97 eye doctors and 1,435 nurses and support staff living in remote and challenging regions. We developed curricula to support their learning, and provided additional on the job training to 3,169 existing eye health professionals. But Fred knew that getting cataract sufferers out of the darkness and onto the operating table was no easy feat. That’s why we also trained 8,260 community health workers. These are the people who go door to door letting villagers know about eye screenings; organise transport to far away hospitals for surgery; and provide support to patients who may never have seen a doctor before.

Facilities and equipment

The eye health professionals we train live in some of the world’s poorest communities where health care facilities are limited or non-existent. We work hard to ensure all of our doctors and nurses have the tools they need to do their jobs.

In 2010 we built and upgraded 41 eye heath facilities, and purchased and delivered $3,475,629 worth of eye care equipment.

Over the last five years, The Fred Hollows Foundation has delivered a global workforce of over 30,000 skilled eye health workers - an amazing achievement that Fred would be proud of.

With your generous support, The Fred Hollows Foundation NZ works to eradicate avoidable blindness in the Pacific Islands and Timor Leste.

The Pacific Islands are spread over thousands of kilometres and there are simply not enough eye care personnel to reach everyone in need. The situation is just as critical in Timor Leste, where there are three eye doctors serving a population of more than one million people. To address this need, we train local doctors and nurses to be eye care specialists and support them to provide high quality services in their own communities

Since 2006 we have trained 103 eye care personnel – around a quarter of what is needed.

In 2010 we continued to provide high quality training through the Pacific Eye Institute in Suva (an iniative of The Foundation), the Institute of Health Sciences in Timor Leste and Divine Word University in Papua New Guinea.

The year in statistics:

• A total of 50 students graduated from our courses across the region.
• 25 students graduated from the Pacific Eye Institute: 12 with the Postgraduate Diploma in Eye Care; seven with the Postgraduate Certificate in Diabetes Eye Care; and six with the Postgraduate Diploma in Ophthalmology.
• Ten students graduated from Divine Word University with the Postgraduate Diploma in Eye Care and a further eight are expected to graduate in 2011.
• 15 students completed the Certificate of Eye Care in Timor Leste bringing the number of qualified eye health personnel to 30.

In 2010 more than 3000 people received sight-restoring surgery and we dispensed over 3632 pairs of spectacles – huge achievements given the geographical challenges we face in the Pacific.

Our long term goal is to train enough personnel to meet the on-going eye care needs in the 13 countries where we work. But in the meantime, thousands of people living in remote islands and rural communities have very limited access to eye care. To address this need we run a Surgical Outreach Program from the Pacific Eye Institute to provide support to under-resourced hospitals and medical centres around the region. The Program provides a hands-on training opportunity for ophthalmology students who perform cataract and other sight-restoring surgeries under the supervision of experienced ophthalmologists.

In 2010 the Pacific Eye Institute held outreaches in five countries, including the first Foundation-funded outreach to Samoa. We screened over 5,200 patients and performed more than 1,200 sight-restoring surgeries.

• Fiji: Five outreaches were held in five hospitals across Fiji. A total of 2735 patients were screened and 376 sight-restoring surgeries were performed.
• Solomon Islands: Two outreaches were held in two different locations in the Solomon Islands. A total of 714 patients were screened and 148 sight-restoring surgeries were performed.
• Papua New Guinea: One outreach was held in Goroka Hospital in the east of Papua New Guinea.  A total of 350 patients were screened and 145 sight-restoring surgeries were performed.
• Vanuatu: Three outreaches were held in three hospitals across Vanuatu. A total of 1009 patients were screened and 304 sight-restoring surgeries were performed.
• Samoa: Two outreaches were held in Samoa, including our first outreach to Savai’i. A total of 426 patients were screened and 269 sight-restoring surgeries were performed.

Other eye care services provided in 2010:

• At the Pacific Eye Institute in Suva our staff performed 1344 sight-saving surgeries.
• At the Modilon Eye Clinic in Madang, Papua New Guinea, our staff performed more than 575 sight-saving surgeries. 322 of these were cataract surgeries.
• Throughout 2010 our surgical team in Timor Leste operated out of a shipping container converted into a surgical theatre with help from the New Zealand Defence Force. Despite the difficulties of working in a confined space without a consistent power supply, the team was able to complete more than 40 sight-restoring surgeries a month.
• In conjunction with Fo Naroman Timor Leste (a local eye care organisation) we ran an outreach service to people living in remote and rural areas. A total of 4737 patients had their eyes examined, and 3632 pairs of spectacles were dispensed.