Helping people find their lives again - RNIB

Our work in 2008/09
Stopping people losing their sight unnecessarily
Nearly three in ten people who are registered blind have an eye condition that could have been
prevented if detected early enough. We are committed to making this shocking reality a thing of
the past. During the year RNIB spent £1,674,000 stopping people losing their sight
unnecessarily, of which £1,668,000 was made possible by income from donors.
Targets
1. Ensure that at least 75 per
cent of Primary Care Trusts
(PCTs) offer the new
treatments for wet AMD by
March 2009 by lobbying
NICE to issue and implement
final guidance.
2. As part of the Glaucoma
Alliance, we will continue to
make blindness from
ignorance a thing of the past
through a pilot scheme
targeting at-risk family
members of people with
glaucoma.
3. Encourage older people to
take up their free eye test
and so stop people over 60
risking blindness because of
the fear of costly glasses.
Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is the most common
cause of sight loss in the UK, with 26,000 new cases each year.
In August 2008, NICE issued final guidance ending the
postcode lottery and giving free access to the sight-saving
treatments to anyone meeting criteria. The guidance and the
occasional combined pressure of RNIB, the Royal College of
Ophthalmologists and the Macular Disease Society have meant
that the vast majority of PCTs fund treatments automatically.
Our work continues to ensure no one is denied sight-saving
treatments.
Information is power! We launched innovative large scale pilots
at eye hospital clinics within Glasgow, Peterborough, Bristol and
Exeter NHS Trusts to warn siblings of their increased risk of
developing glaucoma. In addition more Black African and
Caribbean families, who are four to five times more likely to
develop glaucoma, know how to look after their sight thanks to
an RNIB outreach project in London.
We secured exceptional media coverage to promote eye health
messages through our “Happy Eyes” campaign, which focused
on the message that an eye test wasn’t just about getting new
glasses, but rather an eye health check. Affordability remains a
big issue for older people and we will continue to press home
this message.
10 RNIB annual report and accounts 2008/09