Pune Camp: The Hospital Cornea Retrieval Programme (HCRP), launched at Sassoon Hospital in November last year, has raised the hopes of visually-impaired people. Thanks to HCRP, the availability of good quality corneal tissues in the city has now become easier.
Pune is the first city in the State and the third in the country where HCRP has been launched. It is a Public-Private-Partnership Programme under which the Government of Maharashtra has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with US-based NGO Sightlife and HV Desai Eye Hospital based in Mohommadwadi in Pune.
The programme has also resulted in a significant rise in the availability of corneal tissues meant for vision restoration, which was earlier difficult. Earlier, Sassoon Hospital banked only on voluntary donors, which could get them not more than 25 corneal tissues annually. However, with the launch of HCRP, Sassoon Hospital has managed to get 172 corneal tissues in merely eight months. The reason being dedicated grief counsellors who convince the families of the deceased to donate eyes rather than just waiting for voluntary donors.
Sassoon Hospital now registers at least one cornea transplant a day and the rate of utilisation of tissues for vision restoration has risen from a mere 20 per cent to about 60 per cent, after the launch of HCRP.
Dr Salim Pathan, Lecturer and Eye Bank Incharge at Sassoon Hospital, told Sakal Times, “Earlier, we used to get only about 25 corneal tissues in a year but not all qualified for vision restoration. This meant that the utilisation rate remained very low. However, in the last eight months, we have noticed a leap in the number of quality tissues that are being used for transplants.”
HCRP is a very targeted approach in which there are five grief counsellors present at the hospital round the clock. Superior quality tissues are now retrieved within the permissible time (six to eight hours post death) of utilisation, he explained.
“After Delhi and Hyderabad, Pune is the only city to have HCRP. We ensure that the tissue quality is maintained as poor quality tissues do not serve the optical purpose,” said Dr SV Ambekar, Head of Opthalmology Department of Sassoon Hospital.
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