School screening in rural Kenya – using a mobile phone!

Last spring, we told you how Operation Eyesight helped fund an exciting technological development that will revolutionize eye examination: a smartphone application called Portable Eye Examination Kit (PEEK). Now being tested in rural schools in Kenya, the school-based PEEK pilot project is helping build capacity of teachers to monitor and evaluate the visual acuity of… Continue reading School screening in rural Kenya – using a mobile phone!

Ridgewood Rotary brings water and opportunity to Kenyan school

Last September, we told you about Sarah Kiruri, a teacher at Kishermoruak Primary School in southern Kenya. Today we’d like to tell you about Ridgewood Rotary Club, a generous group of donors working behind the scenes to help keep Sarah’s school running smoothly. In 2008, Ridgewood Rotary, a club from New Jersey, USA, formed a… Continue reading Ridgewood Rotary brings water and opportunity to Kenyan school

Teacher is “mother of cleanliness” to her students

Trachoma is a blinding eye disease that is prevalent in Kenya’s Narok District. Caused by bacterial infection, it spreads easily through contact with eye discharge from infected people on hands, towels and clothing, and also through direct transmission by flies. But trachoma can be prevented with proper sanitation – and Sarah Kiruri, a teacher at… Continue reading Teacher is “mother of cleanliness” to her students

Overcoming flies, cows and 30 km to save sight

Thirty kilometres may not seem like a big distance to us, but it was a huge barrier for Norkitoip, a 45-year-old Kenyan mother of eight. Norkitoip was afflicted with trichiasis, a condition whereby repeated trachoma infections turned her eyelashes inward to rub her cornea. Although she described it as “painful and uncomfortable,” she and her… Continue reading Overcoming flies, cows and 30 km to save sight