To meet both immediate and long-term needs of communities without access to eye care, Optometry Giving Sight focuses efforts on training, establishing vision centers and optometry schools and delivering eye care services.
We work with reputable organizations who have knowledge, connections and experience to create successful programs in developing countries.
Funding of these projects is only possible through the support of our generous donors.
Train
There is a severe shortage of eye care workers in parts of the world where they are most needed. We believe that people in these underserved communities deserve the same standard of eye care that is enjoyed in the developed world. Optometry Giving Sight is committed to investing in long-term strategies for education and human resource development within these communities.
To accomplish this goal, we work to establish education programs and schools of optometry. Local people are trained as degree-qualified optometrists, optometric and eyeglass technicians, refractionists, eye care health workers and vision center staff.
Establish
For many people who experience vision problems in underserved communities, it’s not as easy as walking into a local optometrist for an eye exam. A vision center allows people to receive eye exams and, if needed, affordable glasses or referrals for secondary treatment. As with all projects funded by Optometry Giving Sight, new vision centers are established with aims of becoming sustainable and financially independent over time. As well as providing a place where people can access eye care, vision centers provide trained local eye care professionals a workplace where they can share their new skills with the local community.
By donating to Optometry Giving Sight, you help to establish vision centers and give communities access to eye care facilities where they have never existed before.
Deliver
While 80 percent of all global visual impairment is preventable, about 90 percent of the world’s visually impaired people live in developing countries.* The number one cause of visual impairment globally is uncorrected refractive error, put simply, the need for an eye exam and a pair of glasses.* The good news is that uncorrected refractive error is a solvable problem, and you can help!
Restoring sight can turn a life of poverty, into a life of opportunity. Optometry Giving Sight aims to mobilize resources to help the more than 1.22 billion people in the world who are living as blind or vision impaired. We are the ONLY global fundraising initiative that specifically targets this issue.
*World Heath Organization
Our Project Partners
Optometry Giving Sight supports the implementation of domestic and international eye care projects by awarding grants to our Project Partners. These projects include the establishment and development of vision centers, schools of optometry and service delivery of desperately needed vision care. We want to acknowledge our gratitude to these partners for their commitment to Giving Sight and Hope by creating sustainable and accessible eye care programs around the world. The following organizations received funding from Winter 2020 to 2023:
Asia Pacific Council of Optometry, Berkeley Vision, Brien Holden Foundation, Canadian Vision Care, Downtown Eastside Eye Clinic, Ecole d’optométrie de l’université de montréal, EYElliance, FUDEM – Fundación para el Desarrollo de la Mujer, Fundación Ver Bien para Aprender Mejor, Global Ophthalmic Institute, In Her Vision Foundation, India Vision Institute, Kids Doc on Wheels, Light for the World International, Mzuzu University, Nepalese Assn of Optometrists, Operation Eyesight, Penonome Lions Club, RestoringVision, Right to Sight, Saving KidSight, See Better. Learn Better Jamaica, Seva Foundation, Siloam Mission, Special Olympics, Symbiosis International, The Guerrero Crystal Foundation, The Hope Alliance, Vision Action, Vision for the Poor, Vision Institute of Canada, Vision Spring, VOSH California, VOSH International, World Council of Optometry
You can transform lives by Giving Sight
Your support makes a difference for people, families and entire communities across the globe.
Find out how you can help.
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