Journalism of Courage
Two have passed Class X and one Class IX, but these women living in shanties in Phule Nagar and Indira Nagar at Yerawada and Alandi Road have been been conducting a house-to-house survey, armed with standardised charts and pen torch, checking people’s eyesight. In the past six months, they have reached out to 42,000 people at the slums in Yerawada in a bid to to encourage screening of vision and prevent blindness.
Thirty-six-year-old Archana Bhavsar, a mother of two, decided to take up this mission when she got an offer from the local community eye care foundation that had launched an eye care campaign. “We were given a 10-day training period to conduct surveys and carry out vision tests,” said Archana.
Her partner, 29-year-old Shabana Shaikh, who resides at a slum in Indiranagar, too was excited with the offer that paid them Rs 4,500 per month. “We understood the difference between normal vision, peripheral vision, refractive errors such as nearsightedness or farsightedness,” she said. After the 10-day training, the foundation gave us ‘white coats’ and we were so proud to interact with the community,” she added.
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Sunita Gaikwad, the third woman in the team, was also guided by the project coordinator Ragini Salgude who is a medical social worker from Hadapsar and accompanied the trio. “Initially, there was some reluctance from the slum dwellers to be screened by us. However, once the screening was done and they were taken to the community centre eye clinic, they realised we did a sincere job,” said Ragini.
The house-to-house examination helped senior residents, disabled people, children, pregnant mothers, sick and those staying alone who would not easily go to an eye care centre when told about vision problems. Here, we were able to take preventive steps, she said.
The project involved reaching out to slum dwellers in Vishrantwadi, Yerwada,Yerwada Gaonthan, Navi khadki, Phulenagar, Indiranagar, Rajiv Gandhi Nagar and surrounding areas on how to take care of one’s eyes and prevent visual impairment and blindness, Dr Parikshit Gogate, trustee of the community eye care foundation and opthalmologist told The Indian Express.
So far, a population of 42,000 has been covered, including 9,213 families. In all, 29,413 individuals had their vision tested in their homes with a standardised chart and a pen torch. While 278 persons were completely blind, 842 cataracts were detected and many underwent free or subsidised surgery.
