— as World Glaucoma Week concludes

By Shirley Thomas
THE curtain on Friday came down on activities in observance of World Glaucoma Week (WGW) in Guyana, with a collaborative eye-care project between Optique Vision Care and the Rotary Club of Stabroek, which saw a number of students benefiting from free eye tests and the distribution of free spectacles.

The club teamed up with Optique Vision Care, owned by Mr Dhani Narine, and who is himself a member of the club, to provide comprehensive eye examinations for 32 children from two orphanages and four public schools.
Of the 32 students who were thoroughly examined by the company’s optometrists, spectacles were prescribed and made available, free of charge, to 17 of them.
The presentation of the spectacles to the students was done on Friday afternoon, during a simple handing-over ceremony held at Optique Vision Care, Giftland Mall, Liliendaal,Greater Georgetown.
Making the presentations were Managing Director, Dhani Narine and Optometrist, Claudia Suarez.
Others present at the ceremony included Dr Shailendra Sugrim, Consultant Ophthalmologist; Mrs Madonna Narine, Optometrist; Mr Marcel Gaskin, Assistant Governor, District 7030 (Antigua – French Guiana); Mr Coby Frimpong, President of Rotary Club of Stabroek ; and Luana Falcomer and Grace Mc Calman, both of the Stabroek Club.
Delivering brief remarks on behalf of the club was President Frimpong, who lauded the management of Optique Vision Care for supporting the initiative, testimony to their commitment to good corporate and social responsibility.
The 17 recipients of spectacles whose ages range between 10 and 16 years had very high prescriptions and were experiencing difficulty reading in school, said Mrs Madonna Narine, wife of Dhani Narine. They will be given follow-up tests within the next six months.
Meanwhile, Optometrist Claudia Suarez said the conditions detected were largely astigmatism and myopia.
Astigmatism is an optical defect in which vision is blurred due to the inability of the optics of the eye to focus a point object into a sharp, focused image on the retina. This may be due to an irregular or toric curvature of the cornea or lens.
Myopia, also known as near-sightedness and short-sightedness, is a condition of the eye whereby the light that comes in does not directly focus on the retina but in front of it, causing the image that one sees when looking at a distant object to be out of focus. It does not affect focus when looking at a close object.
World Glaucoma Week is observed from March 6-12 and this initiative of the Rotary Club of Stabroek and Optique Vision Care is a collaborative effort in the fight to eliminate global blindness and visual impairment, Mr Dhani Narine said.
Glaucoma is an eye condition that causes damage to the optic nerve which affects one’s vision. Symptoms are not usually active, so regular eye checks are the only means by which this disease can be detected in its early stages. Once detected, treatment can preserve sight, Narine said.
The representatives of the Rotary of Stabroek expressed gratitude to Mr and Mrs Dhani Narine and Optique Vision Care for their humanitarian partnership in the initiative, aimed at providing eye care for the students.
The Rotary Club of Stabroek is known for its significant contributions to the less fortunate through community-based projects that are focused mainly on literacy and skills training.
Over the past 10 years, the Rotary Club of Stabroek has participated in several projects, both independently and jointly with other organisations, to achieve its objectives. This was the second eye-care project undertaken by the Rotary Club of Stabroek.