Joint Secretary in Health Ministry stresses on the need to standardise optometry

Updated on: Thursday, September 20, 2012

Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare Joint Secretary Sujaya Krishnan stressed here that there is an urgent need to standardise optometry education and  curriculum in the country.
 
"India has 12 million blind people and most have refractive error problem. We are on par with the world in cataract treatment but there is a great urgency to excel in the other areas of eye care too," Sujaya Krishnan said.
 
Speaking at the first anniversary of city-based India Vision Institute (IVI), an Australia-India joint initiative, she emphasised the need to standardise the optometry education and curriculum.
 
The first anniversary marked the launch of 'Aksauhini', a strategic plan aiming at excellence in vision care and positioning India as a world leader in global vision industry and also launch of ‘IVI Academy for Eyecare Educators to
support 130 existing Optometry schools in India, according to a release.
 
L V Prasad Eye Institute, (LVPEI), Chairman Dr G N Rao pointed that the country faces great deficiency in high quality optometry educators. Therefore IVI is initiating an Academy for eye care educators, where educators will be trained in various methodologies and latest initiatives and exposed to research in eye care.
 
"The purpose is to make the eye care teachers better teachers and develop a culture of research in the country. The massive magnitude of blindness in our country needs engaging thousands of optometrists and this proposed academy will be a catalyst in building a pool of quality educators, who in turn will train and build the optometrists needed by the country,” he said.
 
Six higher education scholarships to pursue PhD in Optometry were also announced on the occasion.

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