Abstract
Purpose :
To determine the prevalence of blindness as well as Moderate to Severe Visual Impairement (MSVI) in the State of Queretaro, Mexico in those aged 50 and older. This information was used to plan for training need of various cadres of the eye care team and establish outreach activities and increase the uutput of surgical services.
Methods :
We conducted in 2016 a Rapid Assesment of Avoidable Blindness (RAAB) plus Diabetic Retinopathy (DR), RAABID, in the entire state of Queretaro, Mexico, comprising 89 clusters of 35 people aged 50 and older, with a total of 5980 participants. Facilities of the Base Hospital were expanded, including the operating theatres and mobile units established to increase the outreachcoverage of services to the population of low income or accessibility difficulties.
Results :
Not suprisingly, Cataract and DR were the main causes of blindness (prevalence of 1%) in the studied population, while the main cuases of MSVI were uncorrected refractive errors, glaucoma and and cataract.
The IMO (Mexican Institue of Ophthalmology) is the only Ophthalmology Training Center in the area known as the Bajio region of Central Mexico, with a total population of about 3 million people, but with an expanded catchment area of rougly 20 million including the nighboring states where there si no training centers, reflecetd in the fact that nearly 50% of the patients are from out of state.
In 2015 the IMO catered fro around 6,000 patienst and slightly more thna 700 surgeries; whiles in 2016 these were 10,000 and 2000 respectively; and the expected numbers for 2017 are in the order of 14,000 patients and 3,200 surgeries.
Conclusions :
Population based data helped the IMO justify the investment needed to expand its services and provide more servcies to the population in neded, including on site outreach clinics and with this, establish partnerships with varios local and international instititions, increasing its reputation as a reputable training center.
This is an abstract that was submitted for the 2018 ARVO Annual Meeting, held in Honolulu, Hawaii, April 29 - May 3, 2018.