Volunteer Abroad Program - Make A Meaningful, Tangible Difference by Volunteering with Unite For Sight

Thailand

Bangkok:

Term: Academic Year, Fall, Spring, Summer, Throughout the year, Trimester, Winter
Durations of Program: 1-2 weeks, 2-4 weeks, 5-8 weeks, 9-12 weeks, 3-6 months, 7-12 months, 1-2 years and over 2 years
Typical Duration of Program: 2-4 weeks
Dates: Ongoing

Description: Unite For Sight volunteers range from students, nurses, and public health professionals to optometrists and ophthalmologists. Students, nurses, public health professionals, educators, and others serve as interns at eye clinics. The eye clinic's eye doctors and Unite For Sight volunteers jointly participate on community-based screening programs. The clinic's eye doctors diagnose and treat eye disease in the field, and surgical patients are brought to the eye clinic for surgery. Unite For Sight funds the surgeries for those patients unable to afford eye care.

Volunteers also learn about eye care and the unbelievable prevalence of preventable blindness. The partner eye clinics enjoy teaching the volunteers about eye health, and some volunteers have even had the opportunity to remove cataracts on a goat eye using Phacoemulsification.

Unite For Sight's volunteer ophthalmologists provide surgical care in eye clinics and also work with the local eye doctors to provide skills transfer.

Optometrist volunteers work with the staff of partner eye clinics to prescribe eyeglasses and provide primary eye care in the community.

Highlights: Unite For Sight provides an amazing opportunity to make a significant, meaningful, tangible impact in the lives of children and adults worldwide. You will immediately see the joys on people's faces when their sight is restored after years of blindness. You will see children who are thrilled to receive their first pair of eyeglasses, and you will see elderly adults truly grateful for reading glasses so that they can read and sew. These memories will last a lifetime.

You will reduce all of the barriers to health care, including financial, transportation, and education hindrances. All patients with eye disease will be brought to the partner eye clinic for surgery, which is funded by Unite For Sight.

In addition to helping the community, you will also be in a position to witness and draw your own conclusions about the failures and inequities of global health systems. It will broaden your view of what works, and what role you can have to insure a health system that works for everyone and that leaves no person blind in the future. We believe that anyone can become part of a global solution.

You will also have the opportunity to live in another culture and develop leadership and career skills. Unite For Sight provides certificates to volunteers and also awards dedicated, motivated, skilled volunteers with special awards.

Qualifications: The Unite For Sight internship is open to individuals 18 years and older, and there is no upper age limit. Volunteers range from undergraduate students to medical students, nurses, educators, optometrists and ophthalmologists.

Typical Volunteer: "I recently returned from the experience of a lifetime: a trip to India. During dinner one night a dining companion asked me, "how do you like our country? How does it compare to the U.S.?" I sat there stupidly speechless between bites because, truthfully, there was no way I could compare the two countries. India was so completely different from my daily life in the U.S. that I felt like I was suspended in a dream world. During my volunteer trip to India, I experienced firsthand a completely unfamiliar culture, lifestyle, and climate. I stepped off my plane in Delhi and entered an exotic, poignant, vibrant country where extreme wealth and hospitality in homes along the streets juxtapose the extreme poverty on every street corner. Just driving down the street, I bore witness to the innumerable facets of India: the techno-savvy businessman talking on one of his multiple cell phones; the well-dressed Indian woman in her dazzling sari sauntering off to do some shopping; the pushy street vendor lingering on the street to sell his wares; the aggressive driver navigating the frenzied traffic; the destitute child playing in the trash heap. While all of these visions of India fascinated me, it was the last, most heart-wrenching reality of an impoverished and ailing population that inspired my trip to India. I helped restore sight to such children and their impoverished families while working with the doctors Sinhas (Dr. Ajit Sinha, Dr. Satyajit Sinha, and Dr. Pooja Sinha) at A.B. Eye Institute in Patna, Bihar. The Sinhas and I worked from 9am to 10pm almost six full days a week. We saw hundreds of patients--the Sinhas saw more patients in one day than many ophthalmologists in the U.S. see in three weeks. We diagnosed all types of eye diseases, prescribed and distributed eyeglasses I had collected in California, and preformed vision-restoring surgeries on patients who had been suffering for years. While our job was not always easy, the results were always rewarding. For the first time in my life, I felt like I made an immediate and meaningful impact on peoples' lives. Yet this medical work was only a small part of my journey through India. Living with the Sinhas, I had the opportunity to experience what so few foreigners ever see: the traditional life of a modern Indian family. I didn't just travel to India, take a few pictures in front of a few historic monuments, and write off my visit as complete (although I did get to snap some pictures at the Taj Mahal!). Instead, I got to see part of the real India; I ate traditional meals with the family and attended a Hindu wedding. I was a minority for the first time in my life--the only white person in a sea of tanner faces. Having traveled to a state where few foreigners visit, I was confronted daily by stares and cultural blunders. Everyone I met, however, was more than happy to help me understand my misconceptions. Never before have I felt so isolated yet congruently welcomed. Like the contradictions evident in India's very nature, I felt simultaneously productive and worthless, significant and inconsequential. Ultimately, what I took away from this experience was so much more than just an advanced understanding of ophthalmology. So I want to thank the organization Unite For Sight for helping get me to India. I want to thank the Sinhas for warmly accepting me into their home and work. And I want to thank the residents of India, and Patna especially, for making my journey so magnificent. You welcomed me into your country and allowed me a glimpse of its soul. Bohut Dhanyavad."--Leigha Winters, Undergraduate at Stanford University, Unite For Sight Volunteer in Bihar, India

This Program is open to Worldwide Participants. This Program is also open to Families, Couples and Individuals

Unite For Sight's Mission Statement: Unite For Sight® is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that empowers communities worldwide to improve eye health and eliminate preventable blindness. Local and visiting volunteers work with partner eye clinics to provide eye care in communities without previous access, with the goal of creating eye disease-free communities. Additionally, vision screening and education programs are implemented worldwide by volunteers working in ninety chapters established at universities in North America, Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Unite For Sight's volunteers work as support staff with eye clinics in Africa and Asia. The eye clinic's eye doctors and Unite For Sight volunteers jointly participate on community-based screening programs. The clinic's eye doctors diagnose and treat eye disease in the field, and surgical patients are brought to the eye clinic for surgery. Unite For Sight funds the surgeries for those patients unable to afford eye care. This partnership between Unite For Sight volunteers and eye clinics enables sustainable programs while simultaneously reducing the barriers to health care, including financial, transportation, cultural, and education hindrances. Unite For Sight's model also reduces costs and expands the ability of all people to "Unite For Sight" and help in the fight against blindness.