Page 26 - Ayinie Magazine

• Effective eye bank governance progress before and after SightLife?
• Professional eye bank management in
place or potential
• A performance driven operation
• The potential to reach financial
sustainability through tissue placement
• A community mission, to serve more than
just one hospital
What are the major results found from SightLife
Annual Meeting - SAM and Annual Manager
Retreats - AMR?
SAM and AMR are designed to train eye bank staff,
share best practices and network with other eye
bank partners around the world.
Why SightLife is partnering with Eye Bank of
Ethiopia?
EBE not only meets our key factors of success
for partnership in Ethiopia but has tremendous
potential to be a leader in eye banking and
corneal surgery in Africa. Very little organized
and professional eye banking exists throughout
the continent of Africa. Our hope is that EBE
becomes a center of excellence for helping
develop eye banking throughout the continent.
Can you compare the Eye Bank of Ethiopia’s
24
I think it is better to talk about current things, the
progress since we started partnering.
SightLife has been a partner to EBE for over 5
years. We have worked with EBE to train their staff
and improve their operations, increasing both the
number of corneas for transplant and the quality.
EBE, in working with SightLife has qualified for
a Quality certification, meaning its eye bank
operations meet international standards, a very
difficult bar, and one worth celebrating. It has
also been able to dramatically grow its output of
tissue, through starting Hospital Cornea Recovery
Programs, a partnership encouraged by SightLife
to work with local hospitals to educate them on
donation and notify the eye bank immediately
upon death of an individual, so that trained eye
bank staff can discuss donation opportunities
with the families of the deceased.
What are the focus partnership areas with EBE?
The primary focus for EBE is to grow the number
of hospitals that are part of their Hospital Cornea
Recovery Program (HCRP), and develop effective
Eye Donation Counselors that meet with families
of deceased to request donation of the cornea.
Each sensitive conversation around the tragedy
of loss of life, can result in two sight restoring
surgeries for another person, effectively giving
them new life through sight.
What about the future partnership?