What are the barriers to cataract surgery in Asia and Africa, and how can we adjust the current strategy on eliminating avoidable cataract blindness?
A literature study about the barriers and impact of cataract surgery in developing countries in Asia and Africa.
Ilkay Evren
2514290
Global Health
Begeleider: Marianne van Elteren
Abstract:
Purpose: More than 50% of blindness is caused by cataract. Various programs like the Millennium Development Goals and Vision 2020 focus on eliminating blindness. The growing population generates a more difficult challenge in order to achieve this. Additionally developing countries in Asia and Africa are burdened with major barriers. These barriers prevent patients to undergo
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in rural China were mainly within the family setting. Elderly people in China are dependent on the younger generation for fulfilment of their financial needs, making it more difficult to undergo surgery. This withholds the patients to undergo cataract surgery due to family duties. More attention should be paid to education within family settings, so that they can benefit from the cataract surgery. As it is shown by (Kuper, 2010) et al. cataract surgery can contribute to poverty alleviation by creating a more positive economic situation. By affecting one family member, others could also profit from this treatment. Another barrier mentioned by (Zhang, 2014) et al. is ‘the lack of trust in doctors’. This is troubling, considering the fact that doctors are highly respected in most other countries. This study was conducted in rural China, where participants undergo surgery in low-cost settings. Some patients believe the doctors in the rural areas are simply not good enough to perform surgery or mistrust the commercialism of the medical care in China. One limitation of this study is the low amount of males interviewed. Interviews were exclusively conducted during work hours, when the males generally are working and not available to participate. Another limitation is that the participants were interviewed by two different methods, face-to-face and via telephone. However (Zhang, 2014) et al. concluded that there was no significant …show more content…
Main barrier found was unawareness of treatment (44.3%) Furthermore, unreal belief about the maturity of cataract and necessity of surgery (11.4%)
Ojo P Odugbo (2012) – Cataract blindness, surgical coverage, outcome, and barriers to uptake the cataract services in Plateau State, Nigeria Population-based cross-sectional survery 4200 adults Costs may be recued by decreasing the cost of surgery
-reducing cost of supplies and equipment and efficiency. Cataract services were unaffordable to most individuals who are blind due to cataract. Most frequent reason 53 (41,1%)
43 (33.6% subjects were unaware of treatment.
Zelalem Addisu Mehari (2013) – Barriers to cataract surgical uptake in central ethiopia 146 subjects were
The medical field in relation to varied cultural beliefs and traditions is something that is important to many, yet rarely talked about by almost all individuals. In other words, the cultural clashes created in medicalization is under looked by a multitude individuals. This is because many do not experience the hardships first hand. For that reason, the thought of difficulties within treatments of health issues or illnesses does not cross some individual’s minds. Nonetheless, each group of people is unique, in addition to, how they perceive the medical world.
Ships like the USNS Mercy can provide these medical services to pretty much anyone or anywhere in the world. In fact during the ship’s recent tour in southwest Asia the crew of 1,200 service members and civilians provided medical and dental care for more than 20,000 patients, including nearly 700 surgeries. An example of one of these surgeries was one in which a boy from Papua New Guinea who was blinded by think cataracts. On the child’s bed there was a sign that said “Completely blind, take care” and after the surgery the when ophthalmologists finished operating they crossed out the sign and wrote “not
The NHS was set up in 1948 to provide free health care to the people of Britain. Anybody could go to the doctor, hospital, dentist or optician and, receive an operation or eye tests that were ‘free at the point of use’. This shows that the Labour government were allowing anybody treatment no matter their class or background. In the first year that the NHS was available 8 million dental patients were treated and 5 million pairs of glasses were issued. This evidence shows that the NHS was desperately needed.
n 2015 the eyewear industry was valued to be worth 102.66 billion dollars and that value is going to continue to grow as the population and vision deficiencies continue to rise. Warby Parker is just one of the many eyewear brands that plans to continue building its brand equity through strategic marketing plans and research. Warby Parker was able to create a niche in the eyewear industry by addressing the most important factor in any purchase which is price. Simply put the eyewear brand believes that glasses are too expensive, and the price for fashionable eyewear can be greatly reduced if they don’t source outside retailer frames. They also have become innovators in the eyewear business through e-commerce and the online selling of their frames.
Introduction Vision is one of our most valuable sensory modalities, it is the way that we as individuals identify our surroundings and ourselves. African American children at a young age are more susceptible to having eye problems mainly because of the fact that they are still children and still exploring their surroundings. It is estimated that around 500,000 children become blind each year but that number is expected to grow. In developing countries that statistic is even worse as around 60 percent of individuals die within a year of becoming blinded (NIH, et al, 2015). This brings about the question as to what are the true causes of these blindness’s
Growing up in a family that immigrated from Egypt, my parents always emphasized the importance of health and striving for a better life. My family did not have health insurance and we only scheduled doctor’s appointments when it was necessary. Consequentially, we did not have the luxury of being able to visit the doctor multiple times a year for checkups, due to lack of health insurance. My parents often went overseas for their checkups and treatments, as they could not afford treatment in the United States. Unfortunately, this situation is not limited only to my family.
This organization through this project will also be able to refer children and their families to other projects, clinics, or organizations if further and more specialized treatment is needed. Education to the children and their families will also be provided by the clinics’ personnel. Lack of awareness, availability, accessibility, and affordability of services are the major barriers for care, so providing these tools to underserved families will allow the early identification of a child's vision problem. If left untreated, some childhood vision problems can cause permanent vision loss, so having the ability to raise public awareness in these communities will be vital to prevent vision problems that could lead to
Wal-Mart’s non-branded, generic acetaminophen was a panacea in my household. During my childhood, all ailments were managed with a $2.15 bottle of unlabeled white pills until a doctor’s visit was unavoidable. This is because the $30 copay for a brief ten minute doctor appointment represented five hours of my father’s $6 hourly wage. He sought overtime to help make ends meet. Ends seldom met.
Because of the personal contact this method requires, this method takes considerably more time than the mail survey. Sampling: Because of the time it takes to make personal contact with the respondents, the universe of this kind of survey will be considerably smaller than the mail survey pool of
The authors did an outstanding job presenting their findings in a way in which the reader can make their own judgments about the topic. Additionally, the authors did an exceptional job outlining the pros and cons of their own study. Graham and Louis 2010 state “We recognize this study has a number of limitation” (p.173). The authors recognize the findings may be inaccurate because of the size and interest of the sample population. The authors concludes this article with a detailed explanation why an individual could question the foundation on which their hypothesis is built.
There is a common phenomenon in the China that many people treated with inequality and injustice in health care. As as Martin Luther King, Jr.’s saying goes “Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane”. From my point of view, i firmly agree with this point in that each individual has equal right to enjoy the suitable health care. It is intolerable for the whole society to make the health care injustice as a seriously public health problem. In this essay, some facts about the injustice will be given.
The University of Houston’s College of Optometry is leading the charge in the fight against myopia, with several studies aimed at discovering how to fully stop the progression of the condition in children — a problem that can lead to permanent blindness. Myopia exists when the eye grows too long on its axial length, Smith said, so light from a faraway object focuses in front of the retina, rather than on it. This causes objects at large distances to look blurry. The myopia epidemic is likely caused by intense educational practices and lack of time outside for children.
(i) Camps: Reaching the majority of the Indian population is connecting supply to demand. Moving the village population to the cities for eye care is challenging: it is easier to bring facilities to the population. A team of doctors, nurses and optometrists, go to a rural area or village with the equipment for diagnosis of eye problems, and screen the population for various visual impairments. If a problem is minor, like refractive errors or mild infection, the patient is given spectacles or medications. If it is major, then the patient is sent to a base hospital for further treatment such as surgery.
SUMMARYBackground: Ocular trauma is a leading cause of monocular blindness worldwide. Indeveloping countries, eye injuries are not only more common but also more severe in theireffect and this may be attributed to socioeconomic background, inadequate safety measures,lack of optimum treatment facilities, use of traditional eye medication and poor education. Objective: To determine the pattern of eye injuries and their visual outcome in TeachingHospitals in Enugu State. Methods: This prospective cross-sectional descriptive study was carried out at the eye clinicsand emergency units of the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital, Ituku/ Ozalla and theEnugu State University of Science and Technology Teaching Hospital, Park Lane
In the course of time it is equally significant to regard the people’s own beliefs , knowledge , customs experiences , practices, systems and structures that give meaning to the ECPH and mitigate the discontinuity between peoples perceptions and the health intervention package through regular dialogue. A relevant , vigorous and sustainable model is required for an improvement in the health system performance to prevent a decline in the status of health and development and also to break the vicious cycle of poverty and ill-health in Africa. There is a highly diverse health system that exists across Africa and its improvement would be based on the convergence of expertise, commitment, and resources throughout the system. A powerful model for improvement would embrace all the proportions that prove to be critical to health by labelling not only the risk factors of disease but also linking health and employment ,nourishment, food security , financing for health and cross-cutting issues. An approach would be better accustomed to issues