Al Noor Institute Doha Qatar in collaboration with IAPB EMR is organizing ‘Early Intervention Conference for Children with Visual or Multiple Impairments’. The conference aims to create awareness amongst health, education, rehabilitation, and social service fields on early identification and intervention for young children with disabilities. Many international experts in this field will be speaking at the conference. Interested participants are invited to attend. The conference will be held in Doha, Qatar on April 27-30, 2011 at LA CIGALE Hotel, Doha.
For more details visit www.deic-qatar.com
Online registration now opens

 

The Prevention of Blindness Union (PBU) in conjunction with the Jordan Ministry of Health held a 2 day stakeholders workshop to fine tune the strategies for the implementation of the Standard Chartered Bank supported Diabetic Retinopathy (DR) program and sensitize all major stakeholders in Irbid region. It was held at the Intercontinental hotel Amman, Jordan from 9 to 10 February, 2011.

The workshop was declared open by the Secretary General of the Jordan Ministry of Health Dr Difullah Allawzi. At the opening ceremony the Chairman of PBU HRH Abdulaziz Ahmad Al Saud was represented by the Managing Director of PBU Dr Abdulaziz AlRajhi. Standard Chartered Bank Jordan was represented at the occasion by Razan Hindawi head of corporate affairs.



The workshop was attended by ophthalmologists, diabetologists, Internists at tertiary, secondary and research centers, general practitioners, optometrists and low vision experts in the Irbid region and surroundings, public health experts , PBU officials and media practitioners. It was facilitated by international experts on diabetic retinopathy and public health ophthalmology. The workshop consisted of several plenary presentations which were followed by group works where the participants identified modalities for the DR screening, referral and monitoring, the appropriate IEC materials and resources in Jordan for the project and also identified HRD modalities and resources in Jordan for the project

 

Using the most up to date studies, WHO estimates that the number of people with visual impairment (presenting vision) is 285 million Of these, 246 million have low vision (and 39 million are estimated to be blind. The Africa region constituted 15% of world blindness while the EMR had 12.6% of world total blindness
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The PBU as a conglomerate of  NGOs working in Middle East and Africa participated in a 3 day Africa wide meeting convened by the International Agency for Prevention of Blindness (IAPB) Africa region  held from 16 to 18 February  in Durban.

The meeting was attended by all major nongovernmental organizations (NGO) working in Africa, IAPB CEO, IAPB Officials including all the Co-Chairs  for Africa, Research  institutions. The meeting delivered on many major issues relating to the Vision for Africa consortium and the IAPB Africa Business plan including aspects of Human resource development, Advocacy and communication, Primary eye care, research, resource mobilization, Coordination and collaboration. Committees in these fields were to be constituted to carry forward the recommendations of the meeting.

During the meeting some new NGOs in the African region including PBU were given a slot to introduce themselves and their activities.  PBU Advisor Babar Qureshi made a presentation on behalf of PBU. AlBasar international – a major PBU partner also made a short presentation by the Secretary General of the organization Dr Adel Rushood.

The PBU participated in the annual Vision 2020 NGO coordinating meeting for West Africa held 10-11 April 2011 at Guinea Conakry. PBU sought to establish partnership and collaboration with the NGOs in the sub region for future eye care programs and activities.
PBU also attended a stakeholders meeting for the Diploma in ophthalmology training institution for Francophone Africa- ‘DESSO’ , held 13-14 April at the institute in Guinea Conakry. Human Resource development is an important program activity of PBU.

 

The World Health Organization (WHO) Eastern Mediterranean Region office (EMRO) in collaboration with International Agency for Prevention of blindness (IAPB) EMR, Ministry of Health Dubai and Sight Savers International conducted a 3-day workshop on integrating and strengthening primary eye care in the Eastern Mediterranean Region (EMR) . The workshop was held in Gloria hotel Dubai, UAE. It was attended by the National eye care coordinators and National primary health care coordinators in the EMR countries, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in the region, World Health Organization. The workshop which was facilitated by experts from the regional and head offices of the World Health Organization, public health and public eye health experts provided a rare platform on which countries eye care managers interacted with primary health managers. The workshop worked out recommendations for strengthening primary eye care within the renewal of primary health initiatives in the region

 

The National Prevention of Blindness Committee (NPBC) of Saudi Arabia in collaboration with the Saudi Ministry of Health, Taif University  and IAPB EMR conducted a population based survey on blindness, visual impairment, and Diabetic Retinopathy in Taif region of Saudi Arabia. The survey used the new Rapid Assessment of Avoidable Blindness plus Diabetic Retinopathy methodology (RAAB+DR). The survey training and supervision was in part provided by the International Center for Eye Health, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

The survey conducted between November 2009 to January 2011 examined 3,052 persons 50 years and above. Preliminary results revealed a blindness prevalence of 2.6%, with Cataract, Glaucoma and Diabetic retinopathy as the 3 major causes of blindness. Diabetic Mellitus was present in 29% of the study population, of which 17% had sight threatening diabetic retinopathy. 

The NPBC and the Ministry of Health are planning another such study soon in another region of the country towards generating more data for optimal planning of eye care in the country.