Sankara Nethralaya, a unit of Medical Research Foundation, Chennai, is a center of excellence in the field of ophthalmology, established by the visionary ophthalmologist Padma Bhushan Dr S. S. Badrinath. Since its inception in 1978, Sankara Nethralaya has been treating patients not only from the entire country, but also from neighboring countries like Bangladesh, Bhutan, Nepal and SriLanka, establishing itself in the global map as a referral centre in this part of the subcontinent. To serve more people particularly from the Eastern regions in India and neighboring countries like Bangladesh and Bhutan, Sankara Nethralaya began offering its service through collaboration in Kolkata in December'2002, serving about 200 patients a day.
In July'2007 with the idea of expanding and offering comprehensive care it moved to an independent interim location at Raja Subodh Mallik Square, before shifting to a newly constructed premises over a sprawling 0.55 acre of land at Mukundapur.
This center became functional in January 2009. The second premises was constructed at Newtown Kolkata and became functional in January 2017. With a team of dedicated 28 consultants and hard working supporting staff, Sankara Nethralaya. Kolkata caters to the needs of at least 800 to 900 patients in a day in all sub-specialties of ophthalmology.
The hospital is equipped with state of the art investigation facilities and operation theaters. Sankara Nethralaya is a not -for-profit organisation working with the principle of providing state of the art eye care at an affordable cost to the rich and poor alike. In keeping with its philosophy, all indigent patients who cannot afford treatment are treated entirely free of cost at Nethralaya. Nearly a third (30%-35%) of Sankara Nethralaya's patients are provided free treatment under a dedicated department of COMMUNITY SERVICES with dedicated doctors and optometrist providing quality eye care to the door steps of people living in rural and semi urban areas of West Bengal.
Both the Kolkata centers have a floor totally dedicated for community services and special operation theatres earmarked for free surgeries. Our community services reach out to not only far flung areas of West Bengal, but also covers territories in adjacent states. Till date we have offered our services to almost all districts of West Bengal like BANKURA,BIRBHUM, MEDINIPUR (EAST & WEST), JHARGRAM, SUNDARBAN, BURDWAN, MURSHIDABAD, HOOGLY, NADIA,SOUTH & NORTH 24 PARGANAS and PURULIA.
We have conducted 1511 camps in various remote places of West Bengal, screened 266647 patients in the camps, performed 48402 free surgeries and distributed 151335 spectacles free of cost since 2009 till date. We mostly perform outreach camps on weekends and after the camp we give the date for cataract surgery and spectacles distribution.
We send our own bus for pickup of the selected cataract surgery patients from their door step and bring them to our base hospital. After check up and cataract surgery, the patients are given postoperative care on the day after surgery and then discharged, to be dropped back by our buses to their homes. All surgery patients are provided with a one month medicine kit and this kit along with the entire surgery cost, food and lodging at the base hospital and pick up and drop services are provided totally free of cost by Sankara Nethralaya.
We have a partner organisation in Kolkata, MISSION FOR VISION who, have 9 vision centers across Kolkata where they provide free eye check up to needy patients in urban slums. The patients who are selected for cataract surgery in these centers, are sent to our base hospital (Sankara Nethralaya) for cataract surgery and we follow the same process for them. We also operate a Mobile Eye Surgical unit at Jharkhand where free eye camp and surgeries are conducted in a fully equipped bus around Jharkhand State for the underprivileged tribal section of the society. We have conducted 104 camps, screened 45522 patients and performed 9716 surgeries and distributed 11386 spectacles after cataract surgery by the mobile eye surgical unit till date.
Being a not for profit institution, we depend on the goodwill of society in taking forward our vision & mission. People from all walks of life have come forward in support of Sankara Nethralaya initiatives and services. We are deeply grateful to all our donors for their continuous contribution and support, as Sankara Nethralaya is indeed an organisation for the people, of the people and by the people of our society.
