Director of Tilganga Eye hospital Dr. Sanduk Ruit.
Director of Tilganga Eye hospital Dr. Sanduk Ruit (Photo courtesy: www.cureblindness.org)
After the prestigious Magsaysay award was conferred on Dr. Sanduk Ruit, a Nepali ophthalmologist who is also the director of Tilganga Eye care center, experts say Nepal should now come forward to sell the ‘Tilganga model’ as a sustainable health care model to the rest of the world.
Talking to Nepalnews, Dr Rita Thapa, former regional director of the World Health Organisation (WHO) for South East Asia, said Nepal should campaign to get recognition from the WHO and UNICEF and replicate the Tilganga model wherever feasible around the world.
“As soon as the WHO recognizes Tilganga hospital as a Centre for Excellence, it will be recognized as one of the best training centres and we could easily sell the model to the rest of the world,” she added.
Former director of WHO South East Asia region Dr. Rita Thapa (File Photo)
She further said that the government and other sectors should lobby and advocate to get that recognition for Tilganga, which will ultimately help for the development of overall health sector in the country.
The government should adopt policies to improve the quality of and access to the health services, said Dr. Thapa, adding, there is a need of implementing the “Health Sector Strategy: An Agenda for Reform,” which was prepared by a dozen donors after extensive research for three years.
She added that if the strategy was implemented it will help to bridge the gap between accessibility of health services in the rural and urban areas and primary health service will be available to all.
Tilganga has shown how a highly specialized service of greatest need can be delivered to a very large number of people, the rural-urban, rich and the poor alike, she added.
Center of Excellence: Tilganga hospital in Kathmandu
Center of Excellence: Tilganga hospital in Kathmandu ( Photo Source : www.cureblindness.org)
“The team spirit I have witnessed in the Tilganga Eye Centre, emanates from the egalitarian working environment that is laced with the culture of respecting each other’s contribution,” she added.
The success of the Tilganga eye hospital came into light after Dr Ruit was awarded with this year’s the Ramon Magsaysay award for peace and international understanding.
Dr. Ruit is being honored for “placing Nepal at the forefront of developing safe, effective and economical procedures for cataract surgery, enabling the needlessly blind in even the poorest countries to see again,” a statement issued by the Ramon Magsaysay Award Foundation (RMAF) said last month.
Dr. Ruit alone has completed more than 80,000 surgeries of cataract patients in Nepal and abroad.
Founded in 1994 by the Himalayan Cataract Project (HCP) co-director, Dr. Sanduk Ruit, Fred Hollows Foundation, and the Jogmon Kongtrul 3rd Rimpoche Trust, Tilganga was the first outpatient cataract surgery center in Nepal. It is now the region’s pre-eminent center for cataract microsurgery, using intraocular lens implant technology, a technique introduced by Dr. Ruit. Tilganga is the hub of high-quality eye care in the Himalaya and has become well known throughout the Himalayan region for its high-quality, affordable eye care services, says an official website of HCP.
Earlier, people who had a cataract surgery in Nepal were given crude, thick glasses that allowed only a poor quality of vision and also caused terrible distortions in peripheral vision. Moreover, if the glasses were lost or broken patients would be unable to focus and again rendered blind. But thanks to the tireless efforts of Dr. Ruit and his team, with the introduction of Intra Ocular Lenses (IOLs) people no more have to suffer from such problems.
The lenses that used to cost around $100 are now available for just US $4 making it accessible for more and more people.
Chairman of Tilganga Eye hospital Jagadish Ghimire
Chairman of Tilganga Eye hospital Jagadish Ghimire (File Photo)
Talking to Nepalnews, chairman and one of the founders of the Tilganga Hospital, Jagadish Ghimire, said the devotion of the professionals, hard work of the management and support staffs and trust of the customers are the key factors for the success of Tilganga eye hospital. “Professionalism in work and service, self-sustainability, donor’s assistance and long-term vision are other factors that have contributed to the success of the hospital,” he added.
A noted social worker, Ghimire said the credit goes to the team of doctors led by Dr. Ruit, who were able to make the patients satisfied. “We were able to provide services at very affordable rates to general patients and free of cost to poor patients,” he added.
Ghimire said the hospital has already trained hundreds of doctors from various countries including Bangladesh and Tibet autonomous part of China.
“Though we are organising mobile eye clinics in remote parts of the country to provide quality eye care service to the people at their doorsteps, we too have financial constraints. Similarly, devotion on the part of the professionals and fully utilize their potential at the local level are other challenges the hospital is facing at present,” he added.
Thursday being a public holiday, officials at the Health Ministry could not be reached for comments. But talking to Nepalnews, a senior official at the Health Ministry, Dr. Harinath Acharya, who recently retired from his job, said, “The government was considering to get the Tilganga hospital listed under the WHO’s “Centre for Excellence”.
According to Dr. Acharya, the government has to nominate a health institution for enlisting in the WHO’s “Centre for Excellence” list and the global health body then decides on whether to enlist it on the basis of the performance of the organization as well as its leadership.
“As Tilganga is an excellent model, let’s hope the government will nominate it to WHO this year and will be recognised as the “Centre of Excellence”,” he added.