Home » Our work » Around the world » Southern Africa » Zambia

Sightsavers’ Vicky Astbury visits northern Zambia to see how a unique partnership between traditional healers, volunteers and teachers – not forgetting a group of young actors – is delivering eye care to rural communities.

Everyone in the room stopped talking when Tabitha had her bandage removed. The doctor gently peeled off the tape which held the patch in place over her right eye. There was a momentary pause; then Tabitha laughed and reached out for the doctor's hand.

The operation had been a success - she could see for the first time in seven years. Totally overcome, I had to go and have a moment to myself outside the door. A few minutes later I came back to find seventy two-year-old Tabitha dancing around the room. She'd just had an eye test and the vision in her right eye was pretty near perfect.

Tabitha was free to go home the same day. She didn't seem to mind sharing the back of the truck with about ten other people - all of whom were being taken home from the hospital after successful cataract operations. Back in her village, neighbours came out of their houses to marvel at a sight they never thought they'd see - Tabitha weaving her way between the huts in the village completely unassisted. "I feel like I'm already in heaven!" she told us when we said goodbye.

Reaching the community

Without the Sightsavers' supported Ronald Ross Eye Care Project Tabitha might not ever have had her sight restored. She'd heard about the possibility of treatment for her blindness through her church, just one of the partners with whom Ronald Ross is working to make sure the community links up to the eye services at the hospital.

The Ronald Ross Eye Care Project was set up by the inspirational Dominic Mwale four years ago. His interest in community eye health, he tells me, stemmed from the fact that he often had red painful eyes as a child, as did his brothers and sisters, but the health clinic was miles away and his family too poor to travel, so there was no way of finding out what was wrong, or getting treatment.

"It wasn't until I was much older I found out that the eye problem we'd had as children was trachoma and that it could be cured using ointment," Dominic says. "It was then I decided to specialise in eye health and train to be an ophthalmic clinical officer."

Determined to achieve his goal, after his general medical training Dominic managed to raise enough money to go to Malawi and enrol on the Sightsavers' supported Ophthalmic Training Programme.

An amazing collaboration

A few years on, Dominic now works in partnership with Sightsavers, heading up the Ronald Ross Eye Care project in Mufulira, north Zambia. I was lucky to spend a week with him and see how his passion for eye health has resulted in an amazing collaboration between government, volunteers, traditional healers and teachers - not forgetting a group of young actors, who are taking eye care to the very heart of the community.

Healers

Since attending workshops run by Ronald Ross, over 25 healers in Mufulira now refer patients with eye problems directly to the hospital, having learnt that many of the traditional methods of eye treatment are potentially harmful.

"When we examine the eyes of the patients we don't use the spirits," says Beatrice Kanto, a traditional healer from Kanto, Mufulira. "If they have a problem with the eyes we tell them to go to the clinic."

Schools

Beauty, a teacher at Butondo High, attended a workshop run by Ronald Ross and now screens pupils for eye problems. Each school in Mufulira has a teacher with specialist eye knowledge working in partnership with the Ronald Ross eye care team.

"Before we start the screening we carry out health talks - telling students about the different types of eye diseases and how to avoid them," says Beauty.

Community volunteers

Gabriel Gabriel Katantala Mutale is one of the 30 volunteers trained in primary eye care by Ronald Ross. He now finds and helps people in his community with eye problems, including his grandmother, who had cataracts and was able to have her sight restored at the hospital.

"One of the main parts of my job is to teach people about eye hygiene," says Gabriel. "The most important drug is health education."

Drama group

The drama group, which is made up of visually impaired and sighted actors from local schools was set up by Ronald Ross as a way of conveying eye health messages to remote villages.

"We use drama in our own local language to encourage people to attend the clinic if they have eye problems," says Comfrey Sikanyika, a 20-year-old member of the Ronald Ross Eye Care Drama Group.

Since the Ronald Ross eye care project started the number of people coming for eye treatment at the hospital has increased by 260 per cent, demonstrating the effectiveness of these collaborations.