A Community Vision Screening Project Of School Children In Kashmir Valley

Background

• Undetected refractive errors can cause effects ranging from poor school performance to possibly blindness over time
• Early intervention can improve academics and personality development; High school dropout rates improved
• Leading preventable causes of blindness and common vision disorders are refractive errors, stabismus(squint), amblyopia (lazy eye), congenital cataract, congnital glaucoma, corneal scarring as in Vitamin A deficiency and measles
• For these reasons it is necessary to have school eye screening programs in place. In rural areas and in the public school system, these screening programs become imperative for timely detection due to myriad of reasons, including lack of education and awareness, economic and shortage of optometrists and ophthalmologists

Our Approach

KASHMER along with its ground partners, HPVT and Al Imdaad Trust has put together a very comprehensive district-wise free vision screening program of children in schools and orphanages in Kashmir Valley with provision of free opticals for families unable to afford. KASHMER  sponsored surgeries for common childhood conditions such as, strabismus, congenital cataract.

A teacher training workshop was conducted to train the school teachers to conduct a basic vision screening annually and for this purpose vision charts were left behind.

Our work in Numbers

Since launch, approximately 1072 students and orphans have been screened under this program and free glasses were subsequently provided to a significant number of those who availed the program, given the short school year in 2019 and in 2020.