Before The Foundation began work in the Western Province of Rwanda in 2004, the only eye health service available in the region was a mobile service. It was limited in its capacity and could not meet demand.

Overview

Health conditions in Rwanda are dire, but the country is committed to improving the situation.

Life expectancy has increased from 39 years to 51 years over the past decade. However, the infant mortality rate is 72 per 1,000 births, and over one third of the population is undernourished.

Eye health also remains critical. In 2006, The Foundation partnered with the Ministry of Health in Rwanda to undertake a Rapid Assessment of Avoidable Blindness (RAAB) survey in the Western Province so we could understand how much blindness and vision loss there was in the country.

The survey showed 82% of all cases of bilateral blindness in Rwanda are treatable or preventable.

Since then, The Foundation has developed a sustained commitment to improving eye care in Rwanda. We are training eye health workers and providing eye health services in remote areas of the country.

Our program enables eye health screening to take place in rural communities through the provision of much-needed infrastructure, equipment and supplies.

And we are raising the profile of blindness as a public health issue in order to build government support for eye health programs in Rwanda.

About the program

Our first activity in Rwanda was to identify a health clinic that could serve as a base. Gisenyi's District Hospital in Rwanda’s Western Province was chosen, and the eye unit was renovated to enable an increased level of service delivery.

The Foundation is helping to establish strong outreach programs, including screening and surgical campaigns.

Outreach programs are critical at this stage because of the lack of established eye care services in many rural and remote communities, largely due to a severe shortage of trained ophthalmologists in Rwanda.

The Foundation has helped train nurses and primary health workers who run screening programs across several districts in the Western Province, and refer patients when necessary to surgical outreaches undertaken by the ophthalmologist from Gisenyi Eye Unit.  

Gisenyi Eye Unit is the only government hospital outside the capital that has a resident ophthalmologist. An ophthalmologist was appointed to Gisenyi in 2008 after a successful advocacy campaign by The Foundation.

We are now also working with the Muhororo Eye Unit in the neighbouring district of Ngororero, supporting renovations to that eye unit and supplying basic medical equipment.

*African target rate is approximately 2,000

Source: National Prevention of Blindness Plan 2009-2013, Ministry of Health, Rwanda, UNDP Human Development Report 2010