“We are planning to expand the cornea collection program to other hospitals. Soon, we will send our counselors to other hospitals,” said Shankar Narayan Twayana, manager at the Tilganga eye bank. [break]
TIO is planning to send counselors to Kathmandu Medical College, Patan Hospital and Nepal Medical College Teaching Hospital for cornea collection.
After the death of a patient, the counselors try to persuade the family of the deceased to allow them to extract the corneas.
Ten months ago, TIO launched a cornea-collection program in order to meet the growing demand for corneas. Under the program five well-trained counselors have been deployed at two major public hospitals. Currently, the five counselors are posted at Bir Hospital and Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital (TUTH).
After the huge success with cornea collection at two hospitals, TIO plans to expand to three more hospitals.
According to Twayana, the counselors have collected a huge number of corneas, which has helped them meet the increasing demand. And they have chosen three hospitals which are the most-visited and least expensive in Kathmandu Valley.
Though TIO has collected the maximum number of corneas from the two hospitals, the forensic lab at TUTH is the greatest source of corneas for TIO. They get a huge number of corneas from dead bodies brought to the lab for postmortem.
They take corneas from all dead bodies except when the bodies have suffered damaged or if the patient was suffering from some disease.
“It´s comparatively easy for us to persuade the parents of dead patients brought for postmortem,” said Shova Karki, a counselor at TUTH. “The parents of dead patients brought for postmortem are already persuaded over everything and we do not have to persuade them any further. They look upon cornea donation as nothing big as they have had to give permission for scissoring up the entire body of the dead person.”
According to Karki, all staff at the hospitals are very cooperative. They have maintained good relations with everyone at the hospital. They have been getting full cooperation from doctors and nurses. Along with the hospital staff, policemen assigned to the forensic lab are also very supportive.
“The policemen instantly inform us if someone dies and is brought for postmortem at the hospital,” said Karki. Without the help of the policemen and hospital staff our campaign would not have been so successful.”
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