Reading between lines

“So far we have screened 10,40,325 children at 78,000 schools in the state, and 4,41,000 children have been identified with various problems. Hearing aids, crutches, prosthetic limbs and other material has been given to 1,95,000 children and over 4,000 surgeries conducted for problems related to sight, hearing and physical disabilities.

Take 10-year-old Swapnil (name changed), who met with an accident and crushed his foot. His parents couldn’t afford medical treatment and the boy had to be physically carried to the Pune Municipal Corporation school at Yeravada every day. Not any more. After a screening programme conducted by the Samarth Hospital in Pune’s schools as part of the Abhiyan, Swapnil was picked for treatment. “We amputated below the knee and the child was fitted with an artificial limb. Now he can walk and run,” says Dr Madhav Borate, who operated on Swapnil and whose team has conducted nearly 700 surgeries so far.

Children like Swapnil have never had a chance at treatment despite suffering from ailments like cerebral palsy, deformities of feet and hands, even burn-related injuries. “After screening, we decide on the children who requires aids and the cases where surgery is essential,” says Borate.

For the hearing impaired, nearly 160 surgeries have been conducted at the Pune-based Ayodhya Charitable Trust. “The Abhiyan has benefited children from rural areas,” says L.E. Kagane, director of the trust, which also sends its team to far off places like Nandurbar. “Farmers don’t have time for their children’s medical needs. So the intervention has been welcomed by several hospitals and social organisations.”

But, as Dr Parikshit Gogate, head of the paediatric ophthalmology department at the Desai Eye Hospital and coordinator of the programme, says, “It takes a great deal of effort to convince the parents to take the child from the village to a city for an operation. Which is why it’s surprising that the children who had never left their villages were taken to Pune for surgeries.” The H.V. Desai Eye Hospital in Pune has been identified as Maharastra’s nodal centre for the Childhood Blindess Prevention programme. Nearly two lakh schoolchildren have been screened and 1,700 surgeries performed as part of the school eye screening programme.

The teachers in primary schools have had a big role to play as they are trained to identify the symptoms that lead to hearing loss or vision impairment. Bhagade, who accompanied Hogale’s parents for surgery, says the programme is getting a good response. “Children want to go to school and parents are being encouraged to treat the disorders,” says Bhagade.

Bharati, an eight-year-old at Pimpri, 40 km from the Desai hospital, had a white spot on the cornea of her right eye. But her parents and teachers intervened only when she started squinting. “She had become depressed and was very shy,” says Gogate. After an operation, Bharati is back in school.

Many more like Bharati are beginning to see the benefits of the Abhiyan.