In the last few years, urban areas have seen a tremendous population spurt which is largely inhabited by tons of slum dwellers. Despite the supposed proximity of the urban poor to urban health facilities, their access to them is severely restricted. This is on account of their being “crowded out” because of the inadequacy of the urban public health delivery system. In such a scenario, the availability of eye care services is a greater challenge. Eye Health is global health and development issue across various nations, as it is associated with quality of life, and survival expectancy among the middle-aged and elderly population. Eye Health also makes an important contribution to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (SDG) and cuts across many of the SDGs; from poverty reduction to economic growth and employment, to education, gender and reducing inequalities.

 Amrita Drishti Urban Eye Health Programme (UEHP) is one of the key programmes of Sightsavers falls under the domain of eye health. It focuses on eye health of urban poor living in slums and aims at establishing system of primary eye care through community resource building and strengthening National Health Mission (NHM). A substantially large number of impoverished urban pockets do not receive any health, education, or livelihood support. Sightsavers works in some metropolitan cities with the objective to ensure comprehensive and sustainable eye health mechanisms for the urban slums of India. Simultaneously, Sightsavers is working closely with the Ministry of Health and the National Urban Health Mission towards creating systems that provide access to quality eye health to the urban poor. On an average we reach out to 1 million people every year with our urban eye health initiatives in more than 13 cities.

• Comprehensive project upto 5 years of intervention with an inbuilt sustainability model
• Incorporation of Mobile Eye-Health Van vastly increasing project effectiveness
• Setting up Vision Centres complemented by Outreach /Screening Camps
• Community Mobilisation and sensitisation
• Training of Urban ASHAs and Community Health Workers on Primary Screening  
• Referrals to Secondary hospitals  
• Distribution of Glasses through Vision Centres or Mobile Vans
• Door to Door services to the urban poor/slum dwellers