THE World Sight Day  2012

In promoting people with eye problem to access eye care services in order to reduce avoidable

blindness in Cambodia through the International Agency for the Prevention of Blindness (IAPB)

and VISION 2020: The Right to Sight...

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THE World Sight Day  2012

In 1996 the concept of an eye hospital to train Cambodian doctors and nurses came into being when the Maryknoll - Community Based Rehabilitation Program for the Blind came across numerous patients needing eye treatment.

The collaborative efforts with the Ministry of Health and other NGOs brought about the formulation of the training curriculum for Basic Eye Doctors and Basic Eye Nurses. With assistance of the Provincial Health Department the former TB hospital was renovated into what became the Takeo Eye Hospital which received its first patient on 8 February 1997.

The hospital had a 64 bed capacity, but the daily in-patients quickly reached between 40 - 60 patients. Most often the patients occupied the space around the hospital in the walkways that ringed the wards.

By 2000 Takeo Eye Hospital was handed over to Caritas Cambodia and the Daughters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul with Sr. Myrna Porto replacing Fr. John Barth the founder.

All along the way, Christoffel Blinden Mission (cbm) of Bensheim, Germany supported the Takeo Eye Hospital both with the annual budget that includes, operating costs, ophthalmic instruments, medicines, and medical experts as medical director.

The hospital continues to carry out the Memorandum of Understanding with the Ministry of Health to train doctors and nurses and other personnel, to provide eye care services, develop provincial eye units and build the new Takeo Eye Hospital which is being dedicated today, 6 April 2010 by His Majesty King Norodom Sihamoni.

On 27 November 2007, the ground breaking ceremony took place for the new Takeo Eye Hospital building. The actual construction started on 2 April 2008. The student house and staff house were completed by 12 March 2009 and phase one of the new hospital construction was finished on 18 June 2009. The first eye operation was performed in the new operating room on 29 June 2009. The old building was demolished on 7 July 2009 and construction of the second and final phase was finished by 19 February 2010.

The development of Takeo Eye Hospital was facilitated through the regular collaboration with the Ministry of Health, the National Program for Eye Health, the local government offices of Takeo Province and the Takeo Provincial Health Office. The land, electricity and water supply are provided by the Takeo local government and the Provincial Health Department