Cataract surgery in developing countries.
OBJECTIVE
To review the previous year's literature related to cataract surgery in developing countries and to provide fast, up-to-date information to the scientific world.


RESULTS
Cataract is the leading cause of blindness, especially in developing countries. The prevalence of cataract increases with the aging population. Although cataract surgery is the most cost-effective intervention, its delivery in developing countries has many issues and challenges. A paradigm shift has occurred in the surgical techniques used for delivering cataract services and the outcomes have been positive in some countries compared to the scenario a decade ago. However, in some parts of Africa, it still continues to be a challenge. Apart from this, the issues related to ongoing supply of consumables and human resources continue to be a challenge in these countries.


CONCLUSIONS
Although manual small incision cataract surgery is the most cost-effective intervention, there are other issues related to the delivery of services in developing countries. We need to plan a comprehensive strategy to deliver the services in developing countries if we want to achieve our goal of VISION 2020.
L V Prasad Eye Institute, Hyderabad, India. rohit@lvpei.org
Rohit
R
Khanna
Siddharth
S
Pujari
Virender
V
Sangwan
D001766:Blindness / Q000191:economics / Q000517:prevention & control; D002387:Cataract Extraction / Q000639:trends*; D003362:Cost-Benefit Analysis; D003695:Delivery of Health Care / Q000639:trends; D003906:Developing Countries; D006801:Humans