Mangaluru: The KMC Hospital Attavar inaugurated the first of its kind eye bank services at the hospital premises here on March 1.

Dean of Kasturba Medical College, Dr M Venkatraya Prabhu Mangaluru welcomed the gathering and said that it is indeed a pleasure for KMC Hospital Attavar which is celebrating its Silver Jubilee year to have its Eye bank inaugurated.

Dr Anand Venugopal, Medical Superintendent expressed his delight on achieving this milestone and mentioned the continuous efforts behind obtaining the license and setting this Eye bank and recognising the contribution of the Ophthalmology department and the Administration team in this endeavour.

The Eye bank was Inaugurated by Dr Jyothi S Shetty – Medical Director of Bangalore West Lions Super Specialty Eye Hospital & International Eye Bank.

Dr Gurudutt Kamath, Professor of Ophthalmology introduced the chief guest Dr Jyothi S Shetty; who in her 22 years of practice has done more than 50,000 cataract surgeries and contributed heavily to the much needed “Eye Banking concept” in the country.

Speaking on the Occasion Dr Jyothi Shetty congratulated the team of KMC Hospital Attavar for offering the ‘Eye bank services’, to the society as there is a huge gap between the number of registered Eye Banks in the country in comparison to the actual requirement to the Indian Population.

She also mentioned that this is an advanced era where the society is more mature and educated about the eye donation concept comparatively to a decade ago whereby the Concept of Eye donation faced a social stigma.

The person who pledges to donate his / her eyes will be giving the best gift to anyone and remembered forever after life, Dr Jyothi stated.

Educating the audience on Eye banking, Dr Jyothi presented the gap between demand (need) for eye donation and the actual voluntary donations per year where there are currently 15 million blind people in India of which 2 million have Corneal blindness in India with 20,000 new corneal blind added every year.

Dr Sumana J Kamath Professor and Former HOD explained in detail about corneal transplantation to the audience.

Dr Rajesh Nayak Associate Professor delivered the vote of thanks. Dr Ajay Kamath Associate Professor compered the programme. Saghir Siddiqui Unit Head and Dr Shobha Pai, Head of Department of Opthalmology (Eye) KMC Hospital Mangaluru were also present.

On this Occasion the Renovated, State of the Art Out Patient Department of Obstetrics & Gynaecology was also inaugurated.