A record number of patients received the gift of sight when our medical volunteers worked at the Adventist Hospital, Santiago City in the Philippines for our seventh annual surgical trip, in partnership with Open Heart International.

142 people, many of them children, had their eyesight restored by cataract surgery thanks to local doctors and nurses and our medical team, led by Associate professor, Geoffrey Painter. The team of local nurses that were trained last year in eye screening were instrumental in identifying and referring patients to our clinic from remote northern regions of the Philippines. Thank you to our generous donors for making these trips reality that make a huge, life-changing impact on the most disadvantaged people in the Philippines.

In addition to our ongoing work with Open Heart International, we are excited to announce that Foresight has partnered with the Rotary Club to support our eye screening training program in the Cagayan Valley, in the north of the Philippines. As a result, we have trained 10 local nurses to conduct eye screening in remote communities where blindness rates are the worst in the Philippines.

Our Rotary partnership helps to build sustainability in our programs and empower local medical staff to support the programs that we have initiated.

Foresight has also partnered with eyewear brand Oscar Wylee, which has donated 50,000 spectacle frames that have been sent to the Solomon Islands optical workshop Foresight founded eight years ago in Honiara, and are being dispensed by the staff at the National Referral Hospital to those in need.

Meet Remy Di Ponio, Foresight’s General Manager

Remy has been with Foresight for 10 years and is responsible for the coordination of all of Foresight’s activities, from projects to fundraising, relationship management, planning, reporting and governance.

What is your favourite part of your job?

My favourite part of my job is working with the most remarkable people, from our board members, doctors, volunteers all the way to the local people in countries where we work.

The most rewarding part has been seeing and experiencing the impact and the difference that Foresight as a whole has made in people’s lives over the years. Throughout my entire journey here at Foresight my motivation and passion has been inspired by those stories and they continue to drive me every day.

Where have you travelled as part of your work?

I have had the privilege to travel across a few countries in the Asia-Pacific region; to work and improve on how best we can help the locals particularly in the Philippines and the Solomon Islands. This year, we are also planning to travel to Vietnam and Bangladesh.

Why should people donate?

Every time I come back from an overseas trip I realise how much more needs to be done in those countries around our region. To give a chance to those people still needing to gain access to good-quality eye care, we need more support from people here in Australia.

We are able to help the poorest people in a very cost-effective way. Being a small organisation we do not have big overheads and so most of the donations received go towards the people that we help.

What’s exciting you at the moment?

Prof Billson and I are planning to go back to Bangladesh later this year where everything started for Foresight over 40 years ago. I cannot wait to visit the Chittagong Eye Hospital – the place that Prof Billson helped set up, as well as meeting the local doctors that Prof Billson trained and supported over the years. Fast-forward 40 years and today the hospital sees 1000 patients a day and local doctors who have been trained by Prof Billson now perform about 120 cataract surgeries a day, which is extraordinary! I am not sure how many organisations out there can be proud of such results that Foresight has achieved over so many decades in Bangladesh.

Foresight has a rich and long history of making a difference to the sight of millions of people in developing countries. One country we have worked extensively in is China.

Our founder Professor Frank Billson AO travelled to China regularly in the 1980s. He was an honorary professor at Tianjin Medical University in northern China and visited other parts of China including Beijing and Chongqing.

In the above photograph, taken in 1987, Prof Billson is pictured with a group of local ophthalmologists and trainees. At the time, Prof Billson was a visiting professor, teaching microsurgery as part of a program to upskill local doctors. The Chinese doctors are now all senior doctors or professors.

During Prof Billson’s work in Tianjin, he helped found an intraocular lens factory, producing affordable intraocular lenses until this day. These lenses are used to treat cataracts and significantly cut the cost of restoring sight. The importance of setting up a local factory helped greatly in reducing the costs and increased accessibility for Chinese people needing the lenses.

The factory was one of the first examples of Foresight’s philosophy of empowering local communities, which is a continuing reminder of Prof Billson and Foresight’s impact.

In November 2018, our team went to the Philippines to provide training to local eye nurses. Our Foresight Director and Medical Adviser, A/Professor Geoffrey Painter, Dr Dominic McCall and Nurse Leader Kerrie Legg led an intensive training program for eye nurses at our partner hospital in Santiago City, situated in the Cagayan Valley, a rural area more than ten hours’ drive north of Manila.
With a large population, high levels of poverty and no comprehensive eye-care services, this region has one of the highest rates of blindness in the Philippines.
Eye nurses play a crucial role by providing ongoing care, testing and education. Our vision for this project has always been to invest in local training and furthering capacity on the ground. A local nurse who can go out to the communities with modern equipment and up-to-date training in sight tests, as well as providing health education to locals, ensures we can get to help more patients, especially young children.
12 nurses attended the training, passed their exams and are now competent in eye examination and vision screening.
During the training, the group had practical application of the screening of a village close to the Cagayan Airport, about 45 minutes drive from Santiago City. 35 patients were visited and the team found 8 people affected by cataracts.
This was a clear sign that there is still a great need to provide eye care services to the outskirts of Santiago City, as the people who were screened could not afford treatment.