Benguet residents get free eye checkup

August 20, 2018 Provincial

LA TRINIDAD, BENGUET – About a hundred residents of this town and its neighboring places received free optical services rendered by the Benguet Association of Optometrists and Integrated Philippine Association of Optometrists-Benguet Chapter in cooperation with the Department of Health as part of the celebration of the Sight Saving Month at the municipal gym, August 18, 2018.
According to Dr. Monalisa C. Ocampo, president of the Benguet Association of Optometrists, the event was conducted all over the country annually every month of August. This event aims to raise awareness to the public with regards to the health of their eyes and the importance of having the eyes checked once a year.
“This does not only concern with the grade of your eyes. Like for example, today we have diagnosed four patients with glaucoma and one with traumatic brain injury meaning, if we will not know this, they will not be able to know that they would need to go for further examinations. Given an example the patient who had traumatic brain injury no matter what you do, you can never get the grade of his eyes because the problem is in his brain not in his eyes,” she added.
This is a joint project from the different clinics and optometrists in the province of Benguet, as they come together to eliminate avoidable blindness as a public health problem.
Within the year, the association is also planning to conduct a medical mission and health screening within the barangays of the province of Benguet to continually mitigate and stop the growing rate of eye health problems of every Filipino.
Based on data from the World Health Organization, 80% cases of blindness are avoidable. In line with this, WHO launched the global initiative Vision 2020 to eliminate avoidable blindness as a public health problem by the year 2020. Dorothy M. Regino, UC Intern