Sankara Nethralaya

Medical Research Foundation was founded on September 6, 1978 with Sankara Nethralaya as its hospital wing. It is the first eye hospital in Asia to have ISO 9002 certification of quality control.

Medical Research Foundation has four main goals:

• To provide expert ophthalmic care at reasonable cost.
• To provide free treatment for the poor with the same quality of care as that rendered to paying patients.
• To conduct research into eye diseases of particular importance to India.
• To provide sound training for postgraduate students of ophthalmology as well as paraophthalmic personnel.

Sankara Nethralaya is a tertiary care referral hospital. Its expert staff and state-of-the-art facilities are capable of managing complicated and vision threatening eye diseases. About 1000 outpatients are seen every day while about 100 surgical procedures are performed daily in the hospital's 22 operation theatres. The hospital sees patients from all parts of India as well as from neighbouring countries from South and South East Asia.

The ophthalmic subspecialities are Cataract and IOL, Cornea, Refractive Corneal Surgery, Glaucoma, Uveitis, Vitreoretinal Surgery, Paediatric Ophthalmology, Squint, Contact Lens, Orbit and Oculoplasty, Neuro-ophthalmology, Ocular Oncology and Ocular Trauma and Emergencies.

Community and rural free service for indigent patients is a core activity of Sankara Nethralaya. Last year, 49% of the consultations and 38% of the operations were performed completely free foregoing revenue of Rs. 5,45,00,000.

The Vision Research Foundation wing of the hospital conducts research on eye diseases of paramount importance to India. The Microbiology, Ocular Pathology, Biochemistry, and, Genetics and Molecular Biology Laboratories carry out basic science research.

The C U Shah Ophthalmic Post Graduate Training Centre trains ophthalmologists and para ophthalmic personnel (optometrists, ophthalmic nursing assistants, and ophthalmic medical laboratory technicians) from all over the country.