Lets try !

She was too young to meet a doctor. Today Bhumika was with me for eye checkup. Sometime I think I should learn Kannada because talking with these kids are too tough. Some grown up, manage English but small kids like Bhumika(7 year age) are too small for English even. Too young to learn anything other than smiling/crying.

It was not different from other day, then Vikram, my office colleague told me, "enjoy weekend". "Oh, weekends about to start" nice to know. I was on leave from last 2 days, many of us actually and its more worth than writing code or playing cricket at office. Today we have taken 13 kids for detailed eye check at Shekar Netralaya. They already visited the school last month and finalized 38 kids who can be operated further. Like previous day, we didn't get a cab/bus to put the kids at Shekar Netralaya. It is around 1.5 Kms from school. We decided to take the kids by walk but if you want to avoid main road it will be more than 2 kms. 7 out of 13 were bare feet...

Asking them, they said that they feel it better that way. Changing an existing system is tougher than adding a new system. It was not good for their health to walk like this but that was not a right time to give lecture. We moved, its regret to know that many people don't use brake of their bike in Bangalore in any case. I decided to do it 1-by-1, rather than telling our bikers to stop.

Hospital was crowded. For doctors also this is NGO work and so they can't disturb the flow of their normal patient. Kids got the chair to sit at least. To one of the excited kids Ravi Kiran, I asked "you want water". He replied "juice sir, it's hospital na". Finally the treatment started. And its hard time to listen new stories. Total of 3 cases, where it was a genetic problem. Marriage in same blood like with Cousin or relative, leads to this problem. What doctor sir explained me was - "getting married in same blood cause this problem at a dominant level. Maybe either his mother or father has this problem but not prominent but the next generation effect is very prominent. Lot of research is going on but we don't have any solid solution yet. "

Finally we got 4 kids, for whom vision can be little improved by glasses of power like +11, +10. Bhumika case was different from all of them. Her eyes are normal but brain connection with eyes never grown up. Can't do much. Research is going on ! One doctor was abusing us, that why you came for checkup now. You know its too late for many of them. "Even for some, it is corneal problem which can be rectified but now their retina are too weak to see anything. If your retina will not work for 10 years, how it should be". Hmmm.... correct ! Some got cataract which can be operated and removed. But again their retina are weak and so vision will not be improved more than 20-25 percent.

I am not writing this blog for any sympathy but just to inform that minor mistakes can lead to a severe problem. Out of 23, there were 4 cases, in which parents screwed up the eyes because kids claimed some irritation in eyes and they put some wrong eye drop/wrong medical treatment. Now, they are crying and why not they left with that option only. 4 cases, where marriage led to this problem. Take care !!

If you have any kid in your surrounding who has vision problem, don't wait even for a day. Immediate checkup is required. Eye power go down with a high pace. If someone die in your surrounding, request their relatives to donate his/her eyes. It's more worthy than what he had done in his whole life. God will definitely bless heaven to him.

Lets give a try before concluding that trying this is not worth. 15 still more to go !