Founded in 1976 by Dr. G. Venkataswamy, Aravind Eye Care System today is the largest and most productive eye care facility in the world. From April 2007 to March 2008, about 2.4 million persons have received outpatient eye care and over 285,000 have undergone eye surgeries at the Aravind Eye Hospitals at Madurai, Theni, Tirunelveli, Coimbatore and Puducherry.
Blending traditional hospitality with state-of-the-art ophthalmic care, Aravind offers comprehensive eye care in the most systematic way attracting patients from all around the world.
Guiding Philosophy
Aravind Eye Hospitals are named after Sri Aurobindo, one of the 20th century’s most revered spiritual leaders. In essence, Sri Aurobindo’s teachings focus on mankind’s transcendence into a heightened state of consciousness through service, as an instrument of what he called the Divine Force.
At Aravind one finds, combined with modern technology and management practices, a measure of compassionate spirituality, an awareness beyond the matter-of-fact, and the impetus of a mission.
Alternate Health Care: Aravind Model
Given the magnitude of blindness and the challenges faced in a developing country, the Government alone cannot meet the health needs of all. Realising this predicament, Dr. Venkataswamy wanted to establish an alternate health care model that would supplement the efforts of the Government and also be self-supporting.
Hence, upon his retirement in 1976, he established the GOVEL Trust to initiate eye care work.
Today, Aravind is more than an eye hospital. It is :
- a social organisation committed to the goal of elimination of needless blindness through comprehensive eye care services.
- an international training centre for ophthalmic professionals and trainees who come from within India and around the world to teach or to learn, to offer their skills and to acquire new ones.
- an institute for research that contributes to the development of eye care.
- an institute to train health-related and managerial personnel in the development and implementation of efficient and sustainable eye care programmes.
- a manufacturer of world class ophthalmic products available at affordable costs.
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