India and Sikkim

The Himalayan Cataract Project opened a new primary eye care center in Kalimpong in the spring of 2004 in cooperation with the Paramita Trust. Co-directors, Dr. Tabin and Dr. Ruit, spent two weeks in Kalimpong in February performing cataract surgeries and working with the local doctor who will run the center. Over this period, they screened 1,380 patients and performed 341 cataract surgeries.

Our Kalimpong project marked the opening of the city’s first primary eye care center, a sustainable clinic that provides ophthalmic screening, outpatient care and basic eye surgery. The Kalimpong center is the HCP’s eighth permanent eye care facility in the Himalaya and is a strategic part of the organization’s efforts to provide high quality, low cost eye care in the high mountain regions where preventive medicine has not made inroads and where cataract blindness is still a major problem.

The Himalayan Cataract Project has plans for another primary eye care center in Darjeeling in 2005-2006.

February 2004
Himalayan Cataract Project To Perform 2,000 Cataract Surgeries in Kalimpong, India