Lotus Vision Research Trust

About Us

Cataract : World wide 45 million people are blind. 180 million are visually impaired.90% of the blind are in developing countries. Global economic burden of blindness is around $25 billion per year. More people (9 million) are blind in India than in any other country. 80% of the blindness in India is due to Cataract, which is almost always curable. Trend assessment points to a doubling of world blindness by the year 2020 unless more aggressive intervention is undertaken.

Glaucoma : The second leading cause of blindness globally with Age related Macular Degeneration (AMD) ranking third on the global scale. The number of persons estimated to blind as a result of primary glaucoma is 6.7 million, accounting for more than 10% of all global blindness. Risk factors are those limited to the onset of disease and those associated with progressive working in already established disease.

Childhood Blindness : World Health Organization estimates that there are 1.5 million blind children world wide mainly in Africa and Asia. An estimated 127 million pre-school children are Vitamin-A deficient and each year 350,000 children go blind and 2 million children die from lack of Vitamin A.

Refractive Error and Low Vision : Recent studies have confirmed the existence of a large burden of uncorrected refractive errors, although the interventions required are significantly cost effective and with an important impact on economic development and quality of life. There are estimated 135 million in the world with low vision of whom about 35 million would benefit from low vision services. It is estimated that there are about 5 million blind people due to uncorrected severe refractive error.

Diabetic eye complications : Diabetic Retinopathy : Vitreo Retinal Diseases : Risk factors for diabetic retinopathy include duration of diabetes, level of glycemia, presence of high BP, dependence of insulin, pregnancy, levels of selected serum lipids, nutritional and genetic factors. Medical interventions can decrease some of the risk to vision caused by diabetic retinopathy. The control of glycemia, decrease the risk of the incidence and progressive of the retinopathy. Timely laser photocoagulation of the retina decreases the risk.