A Medical Director, Consultant Vitreo-Retinal Surgeon at Dr Agarwals Eye Hospital, Dr Asiwome Kwesi Seneadza, has called on the government to broaden the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) coverage to help fight against blindness in the country.

According to him, the amount provided by government to cover certain supervision is not enough to cater for diagnostic tests such as OCT, GDX, VFT, refraction and some eye drops.

He added that the NHIS coverage on eye health only makes up for doctor’s consultation, some generic eye drops as well as some major and minor surgeries such as cataract surgery, Pterygium excision, chalazion excision and glaucoma surgery.

The call was made during a media briefing at Dr Agarwals Eye Hospital in Accra on October 8 to commemorate the World Sight Day and also intensify public education on eye health.

The World Sight Day is an annual event of awareness held on the second Thursday of October to turn global attention on blindness and vision impairment.

“Enough amount and items need to be included in the NHIS to cater for what is involved in doing an eye surgery and once that is done services would reach the poorest area to reduce the number of blind cases in the country,” he said.

He said out of the world seven billion population, one billion people were suffering from blindness adding that Ghana is no exception hence there is the need to increase public awareness on blindness and vision impairment as a major international public health issue.

Dr Seneadza also appealed to Ghanaians to do regular eye check-ups to ensure early detection of diseases, which was critical to reversing eye conditions.

Achievements
An Ophthalmologist at Dr Agarwals Eye Hospital, Dr Smit M Bavariya said as part of efforts to address blindness in the country, an outreach programme was organised some months ago to help reduce blindness cases in Ghana.

He said the hospital offered a free eye screening exercise for people from about 25 villages in the Northern part of the country.

He urged Ghanaians to avoid ignoring issues related to eye health no matter how small the problem is adding that “get your eyes checked at least once in a year.”