Seven-year-old Rabi is quite a shy boy. When we visit him at home, he doesn’t stray far from his father’s lap and quietly observes while we talk about the treatment he’s received through Orbis’s Refractive Error Among Children (REACH) programme, which originated in India. REACH identifies and treats children with refractive error, provides glasses where necessary, and captures screening data on a bespoke database.
A screening camp took place at Rabi’s school just over a month ago. He was diagnosed with uncorrected refractive error, and prescribed glasses.
“I did not know about Rabi’s problem,” his father Binod tells us. “The teachers in school told me he could not see.”
It transpires that Rabi had been struggling to see for at least six months before he received his glasses. His teacher noticed that he would often cry when asked to read or write, as well as tilting his head. However, the young children in Rabi’s class read out loud together when learning. As Rabi wasn’t reading individually it was tricky to identify vision problems. Later, when asked, he admitted that he couldn’t see properly, and that he could only see things up close. The teacher would ask him to sit right at the front of class, and even then, it sounds as though it wasn’t easy for little Rabi.
His sight was causing real difficulties in his day to day life; from his studies, to the half an hour walk to school with his older sister, and even identifying his own mother from a distance. He needed help. Rabi’s teacher told his family about the issues he was having.
