It Takes A Village

IT TAKES A VILLAGE from myriad people and organizations who continue to participate in the growth of the Arizona Foundation for Eye Health (AFEH) by providing countless hours of volunteer time, the funding vital to the outreach of AFEH sight saving services, and the supporting collaborations so necessary to AFEH program initiatives.

AFEH launched its cornerstone program, the Arizona Telemedicine Ophthalmic Program (ATOP) in 2002.  At that very early stage in the development of ATOP veryfew knew the ability existed to perform retinal eye exams in a remote location then transmit those patients’ retinal images to an ophthalmologist at a distance for diagnosis evaluation.

ATOP has provided 5,000 Ocular Risk Assessments for patients with diabetes from Maricopa, Pinal, and Santa Cruz counties in community healthcare settings. Twenty-eight per cent (28%) of those having an ATOP Ocular Risk were found to need further evaluation as a result of their testing. 

Fast-forward to May, 2010. Today, many more people know of the use of telemedicine to identify the all-important early symptoms of diabetic eye disease.  A very strong infrastructure has been built within ATOP, both diagnostically and technologically.

The ATOP is poised to advance to the next generation of development to dramatically increase:

• The volume of diabetic patients screened by ATOP
• The capture of demographic patient data needed by medical professionals in both public and private sectors of Arizona
• Public awareness campaigns spotlighting the importance of “Good Eye Health” to save eyesight from treatable eye disease
• Partnerships and collaborations necessary to effectively reach tens of thousands of Arizonans over the next five years
• The compliance of diabetic patients to have an annual retinal eye exam to track their own eye health
• The introduction of interactive learning modules utilizing social media and PDA applications to reach the technologically “smart workplace” generation
• The efficacy of prevention programming among ethnically diverse populations at high risk for diabetes

It Isn't Difficult to Understand:

One Picture is Worth 1,000 Words!

Normal Vision	Loss of vision caused by proliferative diabetic retinopathy