LENDING A HAND… Fiona Murphy
FERMANAGH Optometrist Fiona Murphy has recently returned from Mozambique where she helped train the first ever eye specialists (Optometrists) in the country.
Thanks to the training from Fiona and her fellow students under the leadership of Professor James Loughman, the first Mozambican Optometrists have just graduated.
The optometrists will now be able to prescribe glasses for millions of Mozambicans who have had no access to eye care until this point and who are likely to suffer unnecessary vision impairment and blindness as a result.
Established in 2008, the Mozambique Eyecare Project is a €1.5 million Irish Aid funded project to tackle the interdependent problems of avoidable blindness and poverty.
It aims to develop and implement a sustainable model for optometric education and eyecare service delivery in developing nations.
One of the optometrists who visited Mozambique was Fermanagh native Fiona Murphy.
“We went to Mozambique for two weeks, we were so lucky to get to see the wonderful work which is being carried there and to see first-hand how well OGS is training opticians to build a sustainable future for eye sight and eye health in Mozambique,” she explained.
“For me the highlight was visiting the schools and carrying out screenings to test the children’s eyes in very rural and underprivileged areas, they were all so excited and grateful as they had never received eye care and this sort of attention before.
“It was so rewarding for us that those children who needed glasses would be able to see again with our help.”
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