See the Good Things Promotes Do Good Things to Draw Attention for Ban Phaeo Hospital (Public Organization)

Ban Phaeo Hospital (Public Organization)

Suthirat Yoovidhya Foundation funds the Do Good Project for People to See and the Eye Surgery Room at Ban Phaeo Hospital (Public Organization). Because good health is a foundation for countries around the world, public health policy focuses on creating a modern, accessible, and efficient system that supports patient needs, including taking care of the country’s health to reduce the burden of treating patients, which will increase in an aging society. The Suthirat Yoovidhya Foundation believes that good health is essential to improving society's quality of life. Thus, it supports a variety of public health projects, including food research projects for the elderly to reduce illness, medical building construction projects to provide adequate treatment, and medical equipment support projects to provide necessary and effective medical equipment. All support aims to raise treatment standards for community-sized hospitals (Hosts), ensuring that everyone in the community has equal access to high-quality public health services.

Recognize the Issue and Take the Initiative to Make It Visible

Cataracts are the leading cause of blindness worldwide, with a higher incidence in developing countries. If we focus on Thailand, this disease is regarded as the country’s most serious eye public health issue. According to the 4th Blindness Survey in 2006-2007, the Ministry of Public Health’s Eye Health Promotion Project Working Group discovered that cataracts were the leading cause of 51% of vision loss. Timely cataract surgery will allow half of Thai people who are blind to regain their sight.

In addition, estimated statistics show that there are more than 60,000 new cataract patients per year, while more than 100,000 patients wait to receive treatment because they live in remote areas without expert ophthalmologists, are poor and cannot afford medical care, and are afraid of treatment because they lack knowledge and understanding of this disease.

Because we recognized this issue, Ban Phaeo Hospital (Public Organization) and the National Health Security Office (NHSO) launched a project in 2016 to launch a mobile cataract surgery unit and travel to perform surgery in remote areas with a shortage of ophthalmologists throughout the country on a weekly basis. The goal is to help at least 5,000-6,000 people in remote and impoverished areas of the country and neighboring countries regain their vision each year. It has become synonymous with providing people with another opportunity to see and gain confidence in a mobile surgical unit trusted by patients all over the country.

Join Us Open Thousands of Eyes

When seeing the determined and continuous work of the mobile surgical unit at Ban Phaeo Hospital (Public Organization), Suthirat Yoovidhya Foundation therefore supports 10,000,000 baht to launch a proactive service unit to provide services to patients with moderately severe low vision cataract to blindness (Blinding Cataract) through the “Do Good for People to See” project to help reduce public health problems in Thai society and increase the opportunity for more surgeries.

In 2022, Ban Phaeo Hospital (Public Organization) received financial assistance to complete the project in the provinces of Chanthaburi, Surin, and Samut Sakhon. There were 1,521 patient screenings, and 57 people received surgery out of a total of 509 surgeries, which were divided among Khao Sukim Nurse in Chanthaburi Province (29 cases), Chom Phra Hospital in Surin Province (14 cases), Chumphon Buri Hospital in Surin Province (12 cases), and Ban Phaeo Eye Hospital in Samut Sakhon Province (2 cases).

Another Crucial Change Opportunity

Dr. Phonthep Phongthawikorn, ophthalmologist, retina specialist, and director of Banphaeo Hospital (Public Organization) saw that in addition to increasing the efficiency and quantity of mobile surgical units, building Ban Phaeo Eye Hospital into a modern eye specialist hospital, having an adequate number of operating rooms to shorten the waiting time for surgery will greatly improve people’s chances. Thus, this project was launched in 2015 with a budget of 400 million baht and raised entirely through donations, with no government funding. The construction took nearly ten years.

The operating room, which requires a large budget, is still unfinished due to a lack of funds. The Suthirat Yoovidhya Foundation donated 69,900,000 baht to build 9 sterile eye surgery rooms to speed up treatment. These operating rooms can treat 1,000 cataract patients per day, allowing ophthalmologists to treat more patients faster.

Banphaeo