Vision 2020 - World Health Organization

VISION 2020 GLOBAL INITIATIVE FOR THE ELIMINATION OF AVOIDABLE BLINDNESS: ACTION PLAN 2006–2011
TECHNOLOGY
2.4 INFRASTRUCTURE AND TECHNOLOGY
Target
• Set the appropriate targets for infrastructure at primary, secondary and tertiary levels in each
country’s national VISION 2020 plan.
Indicators
• populations served by primary, secondary and tertiary centres (absolute numbers);
• numbers of primary, secondary and tertiary centres in a country;
• at national level, proportion of health administrative areas with eye-care and cataract surgical
services;
• population served by one ophthalmologist or one cataract surgeon; at national level, average size
of the population served by one ophthalmologist;
• recommended, with examples of links to other categories of indicator:
• numbers of district eye units with adequate numbers of trained personnel, improved facilities,
established referral networks and community coverage;
• numbers of primary health-care workers trained in primary eye care;
• cataract surgical rate (cataract operations per million population per year);
• availability of affordable spectacles and low-vision devices; and
• ratio of ophthalmic nurses and assistants, optometrists, refractionists and other personnel to
the population served.
Technology
Aim
• to ensure an optimal supply of appropriate, high-quality, affordable equipment, instruments, consumables
and resource materials essential for the delivery of eye-care services
Present situation and achievements
In many parts of the world, there are still shortages of usable diagnostic and therapeutic equipment
and supplies necessary for practitioners to apply modern techniques to combat blindness. Despite
improved access to information technology globally, some eye-care personnel, for instance in rural
Africa, do not have easy access to the internet or the information necessary to make the best buy.
Much of the information is available only in English. Practitioners are not always consulted in the
procurement process, and inappropriate purchases are made by a third party, resulting in equipment
that cannot be set up, used, maintained or repaired.
Many eye-care personnel are still not trained to keep their equipment in working order, and there is a
shortage of technicians specializing in ophthalmic equipment. Commercial suppliers that can provide
service contracts may be too distant from a district eye-care programme or too expensive. As a consequence,
equipment is underused, which is frustrating for practitioners and discouraging for patients.
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