OSN – Electronic Update & Newsletter
An Electronic Information Medium of the Ophthalmological Society
of Nigeria
Volume
No 3 Issue
No 3
July - September 2006
www.osn.org
Contents
1.
OSN president’s Note
2.
Vision
for the Future Nigeria
3.
International Conferences: OSEA,MEACO
4.
Workshops/ Meetings
5.
NBLVS project
6.
Kaduna2006
7.
Ebeano 2007(Enugu)
8.
World sight Day
9.
Announcements
10.
Do You?
1. President’s Note:
Congratulations to all members on the successful congress meeting in Kaduna. We are looking forward with anticipation to the Enugu meeting, and hope you will all make the time to attend. Remember the dates are 2nd to 6th of September. This means we will be arriving Enugu on a Sunday and departing on a Wednesday. The decision to do it this way was taken at the AGM in Kaduna after a close debate. The AGM itself will now hold on the second day (Monday) by 6pm. Details of the meeting will soon be circulated.
In the meantime, I hope you all had a wonderful and eventful world sight day. We have received reports from Ibadan and Ile-Ife, as well as Abuja. The theme for this year is “Low vision and refractive error”, and the message we intend to get out is that it is never too early to correct an error of refraction. I am using the present tense, ‘is’ , advisedly because it is not over, and will not be for some time! We look forward to receiving your pictures. A compendium of our activities in Nigeria will then be posted on our website and sent to Vision 2020 headquarters.
With regards,
Femi Babalola.
President, OSN.
2.
Vision for
the Future Nigeria
A peep into - VISION FOR THE FUTURE NIGERIA
4. Objectives of Fellowship training To produce competent and confident
tertiary level clinicians (for individual patients) who have leadership, training,
research and supervisory skills. As
a member of the eye care team, Fellows should know how to assess the needs
in their catchment population so as to plan, manage and advocate for
activities to eliminate avoidable blindness, and provide support for the
incurably blind. QUESTIONS? Do you know your catchment population? What are their needs? How do you plan to meet these needs? What do you do for your incurably blind?
3.
International Conferences
·
OSEA holds
meeting. The
Ophthalmological Societies of East Africa held its annual meeting between the
August23rd to 26th 2006. The theme was ‘Eye Care in East Africa,
challenges and opportunities’. It was
attended by Dr. Babalola, Dr. Oshoba and Dr. Adedayo Adio. The exchange
mechanism with the OSEA is intact and we did have a nice time at the meeting.
One important development was the holding of the networking meeting of the
Sub-Saharan Ophthalmological societies where we discussed the prospects for a
Sub Saharan society of ophthalmology. Dr. Karimurio Jephitha is the interim
chairman of the working committee while Dr. Babalola was elected the interim
secretary.
4.
Workshops And Meetings
·
Neuro-ophthalmology
Update course. The OSN South East and South South zone (SESS)
under the able leadership of Dr. Magulike organized a Neuro-ophthalmology
update course between the 17th and the 21st of July 2006.
This was organized in conjunction with the West African College of Surgeons
faculty of ophthalmology and the Memphys hospital for neurosurgery based in
Enugu, as well as faculty from the UNTH, Enugu. The President of the society,
Dr. Babalola, was a guest at the workshop. It was well attended and very useful
in terms of a practical exposure of residents to the nuances of and challenges
of neuro-ophthalmology. Cases were discussed and reviewed. We congratulate OSN
SESS on this initiative.
·
Late July: A team from the UCH Ibadan, including Dr.
Ashaye, and Dr. Ajayi (representing OSN) visited the Aravind hospital systems
in Madurai, India. This was part of the ICO-Carl Zeiss-OSN initiative to set up
a high volume cataract surgery centre in UCH. The team came back with good
ideas for the project. Already, high volume cataract activities have commenced
in UCH and the Carl-Zeiss equipment is on hand.
·
3rd
August 2006: OSN
foundation holds inaugural meeting: The chairman of the OSN foundation,
Professor Adenike Abiose, convened the first meeting of the OSN foundation in
Ibadan. It was attended by Dr. Babalola (OSN President), Dr. Bekibele (OSN
foundation secretary), Dr. Morgan (OSN treasurer) and Mr. Leke Sanya (OSN Exec
Sec). The account and financial instruments for OSN foundation was formally
transferred to the foundation and the financial position of the foundation was
reviewed. Members were proposed for the
board of trustees of the foundation and a lawyer was appointed to carry forward
the registration of the foundation at the CAC.
·
4th
August 2006: the 9th
Faculty Lecture of the faculty of ophthalmology of the Nigerian post graduate
medical college was delivered by Dr. BGK Ajayi. The title was “The beauty of
Pain”. Dr Ajayi used the occasion to raise money for the faculty, the OSN
foundation and the UCH alumni association. Guest of honour at the occasion was
Dr. Peter Odili, executive governor of Rivers state, ably represented by his
commissioner for health. Over 6 million Naira was raised at the end of a
stimulating lecture.
·
The OSN
ICO project: this is an
initiative to provide high quality broad band internet services in selected
centres in Nigeria. The centres selected are UCH Ibadan, UITH Ilorin, UCTH
Calabar, JUTH Jos, NEC Kaduna and UNTH Onitsha. Four computers each have been
supplied to the centres and the hardware for the transmission of signals is
already in place. A free service was given for four months, and at present,
funding is sought for the connectivity for the next year and into the future.
The Ministry of health has written a letter to the various hospital CMDs
affected urging them to support the initiative with funding for the Internet
service. We envisage a 256/256 Mbps uplink and downlink, enabling fast Internet
exchange. The impact of the arrangement is to be monitored and assessed.
·
August 2006.
Advocacy visit to Minister of health. An advocacy visit was paid to the
Minister of health just precedent to the World Health assembly meeting and the
meeting of the six WHO regional meetings. The team was led by Professor Adenike
Abiose, and included Dr. Babalola, and Dr. Bola Olowu.
5.
NBLVS (National Blindness and Low Vision Survey);
The team is presently in the south west zone and is
requesting co- operation form all ophthalmologists in the zone. You can also
visit the examination centre near you.
6.
Kaduna 2006
·
The 31st
Annual congress and scientific meeting of the OSN. This held in Kaduna,
Nigeria, from September 6th to 10th. with the theme: “Vision 2020, the journey so
far” and the sub-theme, “corneal diseases”. Highlights were:
·
Small
Incision Cataract Surgery course: 2nd to 6th September
2006. Organised jointly by project ORBIS, Surgical eye Expeditions
International, and OSN. Key figures included Dr. Linda Lawrence, and Dr.
Madhavi Ghauta, who does the procedure in three minutes flat! There were
Nigerian faculty in the team, and Seven Nigerian doctors participated in the
training.
·
Opening
ceremony was attended by representatives of Governors of Kaduna and Bauchi
states, Emir of Zazzau. Awards were also presented to them including the
minister of Health, by the OSN for their contributions to eye care and health
care in general.
·
Keynote
address delivered by Prof James Standefer, a staunch friend of the society.
·
President’s
lecture delivered by Dr. Nag Rao, chairman of IAPB.
·
Special
lecture on Neuro-protection delivered by Dr. Miller Ogidiben of the Merck International.
·
Corneal Wet
lab held. Thanks to Project Orbis for donating trephines.
·
Council
lecture delivered by Dr. Apakama.: ‘The role of sex in eye disease’. This was a
very stimulating lecture and great thanks go to the presenter.
7.
Ebeano 2007
·
Next congress
fixed for Enugu. Theme: “Uveitis and ocular AIDS in Nigeria” Sub-theme:
Cataract Surgical services, from the .2nd to 6th
September 2007. Please plan from now to attend.
·
Remember pay
early.
For more information, visit our website www.osn.org
8.
World
Sight Day; this year’s WSD was on the 12th
of October.
We are requesting that you send us information on your activities so we
can make a report on the activities held in Nigeria’.Reports are expected for the
next issue
9.
Announcements
·
Management
priorities in eye care, India. January 7th – 12th, 2007 www.aravind.org
·
IUSG
in Venice 2007
·
Child
Eye Health; Dec 4th – 8th,2006 UCTH, Calabar
Contact roselineduke@yahoo.co.uk
·
Ophthalmic
Nurses course; January 2007, UCTH Calabar
·
AIOS
Feb. 1st – 3rd 2007, contact OSN secretariat or banyad2000@yahoo.com
·
MEACO 2007
Meeting will take place between the 29 March - 1 April 2007 in the Dubai International
Congress Centre (DICC).
Contact OSN secretariat
10.
Do you?
·
Do
you know your sub specialty working group (SWG) Chairpersons?
·
Do
you belong to any group? Now is the
time to choose your subspecialty
·
Contact
the secretariat; osnnigeria@yahoo.com
We would like to invite you to review the
most recent issue of Comprehensive Ophthalmology Update. Please visit our
website, http://www.compophupdate.com/wco.htm.
This issue contains the following articles:
Next Issue:
All States and Zonal branches to kindly send their reports to the
1.
Secretary General OSN – Dr Caleb Mpyet
mpyetc@yahoo.com
2.
Publicity Secretary OSN – Dr Gloria Patrick – Ferife enife@yahoo.com
3.
OSN Secretariat osnnigeria@yahoo.com
What would you like to
read?
We welcome contributions to the newsletter.
We also encourage zones and state OSN to send in reports of their activities.
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