The desire of many young professionals is to work in the cities and enjoy the best of social amenities, but Dr. Michael Adusei-Nsowah, is in a rural area fighting eye diseases among children, adolescents, adults and the aged.
The optometrist along with another colleague who is an ophthalmologist, left some fat paying jobs to taking small tokens as consultation fees to set up his Micro Eye Health Project (which can include the use of an Ocular Steroid Treatment) at Akrokerri, a town in the Ashanti Region. But he drives his satisfaction from the impact he is making on the lives of the people.
Through his Micro Eye which is a rural outreach eye health project, Dr. Adusei-Nsowah has treated over 15,000 people with various eye problems across 52 communities in the area.
The project started with a loan about some few years ago, it is largely self-funded. Dr Adusei-Nsowah travels to health facilities in Asonomaso in the region to give medical help to people who require eye treatment.
Residents of Akrokerri said if not for the timely arrival of the project, majority of them would have gone blind, stating: “Dr Adusei-Nsowah is a Godsend”.
It is therefore not surprised that the people of the area have nominated him to participate in this year’s MTN Heroes of Change which is currently aired on GTV every Saturday at 5:30pm;Multi TV on Sundays at 5:00pm;TV3 on Sundays at 6:30pm; and GhOne on Sundays at 7:00pm to highlight the humanitarian activities of Dr Edusei-Nsowah and the other nine nominees.
The MTN Heroes of Change which is MTN Ghana Foundation flagship project was initiated in July 2013 to recognise and reward persons who have provided significant humanitarian services to their communities through personal sacrifices.
The MTN Ghana Foundation is the corporate social responsibility (CSR) arm of MTN Ghana, the leading telecoms service provider in the country.
Dr Edusei-Nsowah who was featured prominently on the third episode of the ongoing season III of the MTN Heroes of Change, said: “I started the project when we went for an outreach in rural district and we found out that there were a number of eye diseases in the rural areas of the country”.
“I am a health care innovator who believe in sending quality and affordable health care to deprived communities through various technological and educative media”.
Dr Adusei-Nsowah’s objective is to reach people in Rural, Peri urban and deprived communities with quality, affordable eye care services and products/ public health interventions through various tele-ophthalmology ,technological and educative media, as expressed in the Vision 2020 global eye care objectives.
The Micro Eye Health, was recognized as one of the Top 50 sustainable Projects, out of over 4,000 projects, across Africa, with potential to create jobs and improve lives of Africans, by The African Entrepreneurship Awards Team-2016, Morocco.
“We aim to scale to other districts in Ghana, as we welcome investors who share in our vision and mission, of solving the Public Health needs of Ghana, with sustainable Health care Projects, through scaling and Information technology”.
Who are optometrists?
Ghana has few optometrists and ophthalmologist practicing in the country’s public and private health facilities, causing a severe deficit in the treatment of various complications. It is important to get help from these experts so you are sure if you need special glasses for your eyesight or maybe even just some reading glasses so you don’t strain your eyes.
Experts say Doctors of optometry (ODs) or Optometrists and Ophthalmologists are the primary health care professionals for the eye who examine, diagnose, treat, and manage diseases, injuries, and disorders of the visual system, the eye, and associated structures as well as identify related systemic conditions affecting the eye.
Optometrists receive training in the basic sciences ( anatomy, physiology, pathology, microbiology etc) and also receive extensive training in low vision and vision rehabilitation, contact lenses, vision therapy and orthoptics, pediatric and geriatric care, public health, clinical medicine and systemic diseases, pre- and post surgical co- management of patients, according to the experts.
These optometrists are attending to the over 24 million people in the country. About 50 percent of these optometrists in the country are practicing in Accra, leaving negligible number to practice in other parts of the country.
More than 190,000 Ghanaians are blind
This is happening at the time when more than 190,000 Ghanaians are blind, representing one per cent of the Ghanaian population and three per cent visually impaired, according to the 2013 Eye Health Systems Assessment Ghana Country Report.
That is why Dr Adusei-Nsowah and his colleague professionals in the visual system need to be supported to reduce the incidence of blindness in the country.
It is in the spirit of this that Ghanaians should vote for Dr Adusei-Nsowah, an optometrist to win the GHC 100,000 ultimate prize of the MTN Heroes of Change to enable him expand his project to other parts of the country where eye diseases are prevalent.
The humble and affable Dr Adusei-Nsowah therefore needs your vote to win the ultimate prize. You can do so by texting his short code name (Michael) to 1406.
By Masahudu Ankiilu Kunateh, African Eye Report
