Happy Holidays from Saving Sight!

November is Eye Donation Month! Eye Bank Association of America (EBAA) uses the month as an opportunity to educate the public about the importance of registering to be a donor, about cornea donation and transplantation, and to acknowledge the work of their partner eye banks. As a member eye bank, Saving Sight will be taking part in celebrating Eye Donation Month and the theme of The Power of You. The campaign demonstrates the “power” that individuals have in building hope, restoring sight and changing lives, including healthcare professionals and partners, researchers, eye bank staff, corneal surgeons, and recipients and donor families.

We will be sharing several cornea recipient and donor family stories in November. Be sure to follow Saving Sight on Facebook and on our website during November for #EyeDonationMonth. Thank you for helping us change lives by saving sight! 

As an eye bank, Saving Sight is an integral part in the journey of the cornea, recovering donor tissue to honor the gift of sight, processing and evaluating the tissue in our laboratory, and then distributing the tissue to corneal surgeons for transplant. During the 2017-2018 fiscal year, Saving Sight provided corneal tissue to 2,957 transplant recipients locally and throughout the world thanks to the selfless gift of sight from 2,480 eye donors and their families.

Our Sister Vicki – Eye Donor Story

Vicki was a loving and caring person who always wished to help others. She loved the outdoors, decorating and design, and reading in her Bible. Most of all, she loved her family and was a proud mother of 3 children, grandmother to 13 and great-grandmother to 9.For the past ten years, Vicki had been in ill health and, while under hospice care, she made her wishes known she would like to donate her corneas. “As Vicki’s sister, I lost my sight in my right eye after cataract surgery so we hope that Vicki’s gift will help someone else see,” says Cricket, whose given name is Barbara but her little sister Vicki always lovingly called her Cricket. Vicki and Cricket had discussed organ donation, but knew with her health she’d likely be an eye and tissue donor. (Click here to read her full story)

Regaining Sight After 23 Years – Cornea Transplant Recipient

For 23 years, Angela was 100 percent blind in her right eye. Thanks to the generous gift of sight from an eye donor and the work of her surgeons, she has regained her sight! When Angela went in for what was a routine eye exam to get new contacts in 2017, her eye doctor expressed concerns about her right eye (which she had been blind in for as long as she can remember) and thought she might have Keratoconus. Her doctor referred her to see an ophthalmologist at MU Health Care. “The following week, when I met my would-be surgeons, they confirmed I had severe Keratoconus, explained what it was, what my options were, and what it would mean if I opted not to do the surgery,” says Angela. “After going over all the pros and cons with my family and the risks (which were incredibly minimal due to my current condition), I scheduled my surgery the following month.” The Power of Donation “Words could never adequately describe how thankful I am,” says Angela of her eye donor. “It did so much for me, much more than what any of my doctors or I believed could happen. It really can change someone’s life in an  incredibly positive way.” Angela has been a registered organ, eye and tissue donor since she was 14-years-old and it’s a cause that is near to her heart. “Now, being on the other side of it, it has given me a deeper affection for donation.” (Click here to read her full story)