16,000 corneal transplantation in last 50 years: AIIMS

AIIMS has conducted over 16,000 corneal transplant surgeries in the last 50 years, Chairman of the National Eye Bank Jeewan S Titiyal today said.
The National Eye Bank housed in the Dr Rajendra Prasad Centre for Ophthalmic Sciences at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences is celebrating 50 years of its existence and the institute has planned several events to mark it.
"We received eyes from about 23,000 donors at the Eye Bank, out of which more than 16,000 were used for transplant surgeries. In last one year, we have performed about 1,000 transplantation surgeries," he told reporters at AIIMS here.

As part of the National Eye Donation Fortnight--August 25 to September 8--the National Eye Bank will tomorrow also felicitate about 100 family members of those people, who have donated eyes, as well as NGOs and social workers who have worked in this field, he said.
Titiyal, Professor of Opthalmology at AIIMS, said a walk for eye donation would also be organised in the institute's campus to promote eye donation volunteership so as to combat corneal blindness.