Modern Cataract Surgery Training Programs
HCP supports cataract training programs for surgical teams that come from all over the developing world. Training varies depending upon prior surgical experience, but typically includes:
- familiarization with instruments and equipment,
- learning surgical techniques in the wet lab,
- observing surgery,
- intensive participation in screening programs and outreach cataract workshops,
- participation at Tilganga surgeries, and
- detailed analysis and refinement of techniques, including post-operative exam procedures and possible complications.
Beyond the clinical training, the trainees are introduced to a system of delivery that enables high-volume, high-quality, cost-effective cataract surgery. Both small incision cataract surgery (SICS) techniques as well as phacoemulsifaction techniques are taught, depending upon context and experience.
See how the HCP Model compares with Western methods
The culmination of training typically involves trainees participating in an outreach microsurgical eye clinic or “eye camp.” Typically the trainer will operate on the first eye of each patient with assistance from the trainee. Then the trainee operates on the second eye of each patient while the experienced surgeon observes and assists as necessary.
In the course of a typical skills-transfer eye camp, more than five hundred blind people will have their sight restored and each local team and surgeon will perform over 100 cataract surgeries. (This number of surgeries is more than an American ophthalmology resident would normally do in a three-year residency program.)
At the conclusion of the training session, HCP often donates the operating microscope, surgical instruments, intraocular lenses, and consumables needed to perform an additional 500 surgeries. HCP then follows up with additional training at the local surgeon’s hospital, facility, or clinic, every year for the next three years.
Teams have come from throughout Asia and the developing world including but not limited to Nepal, Bhutan, India, Tibet, Myanmar, North Korea, Thailand, Bangadesh, Ghana and Rwanda.
