Seeing a Growing Need, Team Expands Care Locally

from John A. Moran Eye Center Focus 2022

Vision Rehabilitation: It's All About Hope

The Moran Eye Center’s Global Outreach Division continued its expansion of local care initiatives in 2021, focusing on reaching under-resourced Utahns with the support of donors committed to saving sight close to home.

Funded solely by donations, the division delivers eye care to thousands of Utahns each year—providing free or low-cost eye exams, treatments, surgeries, and eyeglasses at clinics around the state and on the Navajo Nation. Yet, the needs of the community are evolving and often outpace the capacity for care.

“Utah has a growing population of people who have difficulty accessing eye care,” says Craig J. Chaya, MD, co-medical director of the Global Outreach Division.

“We are completing a statewide vision care needs assessment that will provide a roadmap for our future outreach. Meanwhile, we’re moving forward based on real-time situations we can affect right now.”

**A patient receives a retinal examination during an outreach event at People’s Health Clinic in Park City in February 2021.**

New Initiatives

New initiatives include the local Hope in Sight Retina Clinic that treats diseases affecting the retina, the light-sensitive part of the eye that receives images and sends them to the brain to create vision. Common retinal diseases include diabetic retinopathy and age-related macular degeneration.

A Pterygium Day now assists those who need surgery to remove blinding growths that can occur over the white of the eye.

Operation Sight Day, a yearly Saturday event where Moran doctors perform sight-restoring cataract surgery for those who cannot afford it, expanded to offer surgery throughout the year. By integrating patients into Moran’s weekday schedule, doctors are restoring sight for more patients than ever before.

The global outreach team has also increased the number of yearly trips it makes to care for patients on the Navajo Nation, which has no practicing ophthalmologists for about 173,000 people. The team now travels to schools and clinics in the remote region every month to do eye exams, distribute eyeglasses, and perform surgeries.

A new grant will fund training for Navajo health care workers to become certified ophthalmic assistants. They will take patients’ health histories, perform time-consuming vision screenings, check eye alignment, and measure for glasses. It’s an essential step in building a sustainable eye care program in the Navajo Nation, says Jeff Pettey, MD, MBA, co-medical director of the division.

The division plans to extend its outreach efforts into Ogden in the near future. Meanwhile, the team continues to serve people experiencing homelessness and under-resourced populations at the People’s Health Clinic in Park City and the Maliheh and Fourth Street clinics in Salt Lake County.

Monthly Retina Clinic Meets Dire Need

Launched in January 2021, Moran’s Hope in Sight Retina Clinic at the Midvalley Health Center embodies the outreach team’s work to serve a dire need. The majority of the clinic’s patients have diabetic retinopathy, the most common diabetic eye disease and a leading cause of blindness in American adults.

Akbar Shakoor, MD, and Moran colleague Eric Hansen, MD, launched the monthly clinic because a significant number of their retinal patients had stopped coming in for treatment, saying the cost was so high they could not afford it. Other retina specialists who noticed the same trend are also volunteering in the clinic.

Regeneron Pharmaceuticals donates needed medications.

“It’s our duty and privilege to offer this vital clinic,” says Hansen. “Thankfully, we have donors who make it possible.”

Shakoor, who grew up in Pakistan, says the lack of access to health care for many people in the U.S. surprised him when he moved here.

“At Moran, we realized that some patients were choosing between getting treatment for their eye condition and preventing vision loss or putting food on the table. That is not a choice we felt they should have to make,” says Shakoor. “Health care should be a right, not a privilege. Until that changes, we can play a small part in providing care for deserving patients.”

Diabetes is relentless, Shakoor explains.

“It can cause irreversible vision loss as it changes the blood vessels of the retina. In some people with diabetic retinopathy, the vessels may swell and leak fluid. In others, abnormal new blood vessels grow on the surface of the retina. Once the retina ceases to function, it’s hard to recoup any vision,” he says. “Timely treatments, including laser procedures or injection in the eye, can prevent further vision loss and sometimes help regain lost vision. That’s life-changing.”

Retina Clinic Provides Life-Changing Care

“The treatment has dramatically helped my vision,” says diabetic retinopathy patient Kapiolani Pauni, with his daughter at Moran’s Midvalley clinic. “I’m able to see more and do more things now.”

After losing his father to diabetes and watching it take his mother’s sight, Kapiolani Pauni was terrified when his vision began to fade. Pauni has diabetic retinopathy, which can cause irreversible harm to the retina.

A father of eight, he lost his ability to work as his vision started to fail. He had to rely on his children to drive him and help with everyday tasks. His independence was fading as quickly as his vision, but he felt he didn’t have a choice. He simply could not afford the costly treatments to stop the damage caused by the disease.

Pauni received a referral to Moran’s donor-funded charitable eye care program and retinal specialist Akbar Shakoor, MD. Pauni’s retinopathy was severe, but Shakoor has administered injections and used a specialized laser to repair and preserve his sight.

“There are no words to describe the feeling of gratefulness I have for the Moran Eye Center and how they have given me my life back,” Pauni says.

“Early detection, timely treatment, and follow-up care make all the difference,” says Shakoor. “With diabetes rates continuing to rise, especially in under-resourced populations, charitable care for diabetic retinopathy is more crucial than ever.”