As part of social responsibility, the Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH), Idi-Araba recently embarked on free surgery of a 100 patients suffering from cataract. The patients, who were mainly aged people, were earlier screened to certify their fitness for the surgery.

Speaking to newsmen, head of the team of eye surgeons, consultant ophtalmologist, Prof. (Mrs.) Adebutunola Adefunke Ositelu, said: “It is the management of LUTH that decided that the workers should treat the community free of cataract. According to the World Health Organization, cataract is number one preventable cause of blindness. Different factors give rise to cataract. It can be congenital, that is righ from the womb.

It can be from age, that is salinity, from 60 years of age upwards and it can be from systemic diseases, like diabetes miletus. It can also be associated with injury, burns or inflammation of the cornea of the eye.

“It attacks every age, but the one we see mostly is the one that is caused by age. We all want to age. We all pray that we get old. This is part of the consequences of getting old.
“Cataract is quite common in Nigeria. There are so many communities that have it. We can say the prevalent rate in Nigeria is 10 per cent, but with what we are doing, I don’t think it can be up to that anymore. Nigeria is divided into six zones. Every zone is important, and we have ophathalmologists in each zone, and each zone is trying its best to bring down the number of cataract cases there.
“In the private sector, they can charge as much as N70,000 to N120,000 for cataract operation depending on the hospital, but here, everything about cataract surgery, including Anastasia, admission and feeding came to N26,000, now we are bringing it down to N10,000.
“After the surgery, immediately they remove their badge, they start seeing. The cataract doesn’r grow back again. We are giving them follow-up.”

Earlier at the theatre, another consultant ophthalmologist, Dr (Mrs.) Folashade Bolanle Akinsola, had said: “The method we are using is extracalcular cataract extraction. And the other techniques we are using is minimal surture. The other technique is schlero cornea with minimal surture. All the patients have age related cataract. All of them are over 60 years of age. Ageing is the commonest cause of cataract.
“We are doing about 15 surgeries each day and we are hoping to operate on a total of 100 patients in a period of five days.

“Worldwide, the commonest cause of cataract is ageing. As you advance in age, there are changes in the body, it also affects the eye. When you grow old, there are changes in the protein and nerves of the eye and when these changes occur, the age or the lens begin to turn opaque and that is what is call cataract.
“There are other causes of cataract, but the very commonest cause is ageing or salinity. The other causes of cataract is trauma. Maybe you hit your eye somewhere, or something gets into your eye, like during road accident or somebody put something into your eyes. The lens can become affected and that is what we call complicated or traumatic cataract.”

Contributing, Public Relations Officer, LUTH, Mr. Babajide Crills, said: “It is part of our corporate social responsibility. You know, LUTH is run with tax-payers’ money. So, we try as much as possible to give back to the public. Last year we did 103 free cataract surgeries and 50 free cleft lip and palate surgeries. Every year, we try as much as possible to give back to the public.

“We also make provision for indigent patients, who are not able to pay their hospital bills.”