The institute that opened on June 7, 1994, today provides training to more than 100 international ophthalmologists including Americans on techniques for cataract operation annually apart from providing world class eye care to hundreds of thousands of patients from Nepal and India. [break]
An American degree is considered the ultimate in the academic world and every other bright prospect in Nepal scurries to get one, but Tilganga has proved that quality is not nationality bound. Today, doctors from every continent come to Tilganga to learn the Small Incision Cataract Surgery (SICS) technique.
“It´s been incredible. The training they are providing has been an eye opener for me. I never imagined that cataract surgery could be so simple,” Nicaraguan Dr Mariseulle, who is here on a two-month fellowship, gushes in praise.
“We in North America are not familiar with this technique which is comparable to phacoemulsification technique that is much expensive in efficiency. I can now go back home and use this amazing technique,” the doctor who completed her specialization in ophthalmology from Mexico says.
“I would also like to acknowledge the role of Tilganga Eye Center in providing training to American ophthalmologists in cataract surgical techniques, allowing them to further advance their skills and services,” US Ambassador to Nepal Nancy J Powell had said, endorsing Tilganga´s international standing during the inauguration of a new state-of-the-art building at the hospital on April 30.
The new six-storey 135,000 square feet building has added yet another feather on Tilganga´s cap adorned with many accomplishments. The hospital has carved a niche in cataract surgery under the leadership of its medical director Dr Sanduk Ruit who won the Ramon Magsaysay award in 2006 for introducing the cheap suture-less operation technique to perform cataract surgery and manufacturing inexpensive high-quality intraocular lens.
The cost of intraocular lens, that was around US$ 100, has now been reduced to US$ 3.5 giving ray of light to many poor cataract patients worldwide. “We now produce around 250,000 lenses every year and export half of them to like-minded international institutions who serve the underprivileged,” Dr Ruit says.
“They (foreign ophthalmologists) used to mock our made-in-Nepal lenses in the beginning but now our lenses are rated second behind Americans in quality in South Africa,” Dr Ruit adds.
The dream project of Dr Ruit and a small core group has long achieved international fame. “Dr Jan Kok, who performed surgery on eyes of Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands in 1999, called his facility there a Mini Tilganga,” Dr Ruit says adding that his good friend has since passed away in 2003.
Lhasa Institute of Eye Care established in Tibet five years ago is a carbon copy of the old Tilganga building, Dr Ruit adds, while a hospital built in Da Nang, Vietnam, embracing Tilganga´s principles is the biggest eye hospital in Vietnam.
Similarly, the two-tier pricing system, that he calls cross-subsidy, has become successful and is being embraced by many more international hospitals. “We were short in finance at the beginning and used this system of charging a higher price for willing well-off patients which helped us to serve poor at a subsidized rate. And today it (cross-subsidy) provides us with 70 per cent of our running cost,” Dr Ruit explains.
Dr Ruit, who did his ophthalmology specialization from All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Delhi, and also attended University of New South Wales, Sydney, and University of Michigan, accepts that he never imagined that he would one day be providing training to doctors from these countries.
“This has once again vindicated my belief that what we can do here with our capacity and qualification cannot be achieved by going abroad. If we put on the level of effort that we are willing to give while abroad, we can achieve much more in every field,” he maintains.
premdhakal@myrepublica.com
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