The Register
- Patient
- Blind from a scarred cornea, and waiting
- Cornea
- Given by a donor’s family
- Surgeon
- Ready, at a partner hospital
- Cost to the Patient
- Nothing
- The Next Donor
- You
Still Waiting
- People in India blind from corneal disease that could have been prevented or treated
- About 900,000
- Corneal transplants India needs each year. In 2023, 29,057 were done.
- 100,000
- People worldwide who have lost sight in both eyes to corneal disease
- 5.5 million
Gupta et al., British Journal of Ophthalmology, 2025; Parihar, Annals of the National Academy of Medical Sciences (India), 2024; Wang et al., Ophthalmology, 2023. All sources
They could not see. Now they can.
Each person here lost sight to corneal disease and received a donated cornea and an operation, free. Many more are still waiting.
In partnership with Plano Metro Rotary Club and Rotary Club Hoshiarpur Mid Town
Measure
The surgeon marks a circle about 8 millimeters across, around the scar.
Remove
The clouded disc of cornea is cut free and lifted out.
Replace
A clear cornea, given by a donor’s family, is set in its place.
Stitch
Nylon stitches finer than a hair hold it. Often there are sixteen.
Light
As the eye heals over the following months, light reaches it again.
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That is what one family’s yes does.
Pledge Your Eyes
Some blindness is only a cloud.
When the cornea scars, light can’t get into the eye. A donated cornea and one operation let it back in. We pay for it, so the patient pays nothing.
The cure already exists.
A corneal transplant is one of the oldest and most common transplants in medicine. What stands between a patient and their sight is a donated cornea.
Here is that operation.
Every transplant is numbered.
The clubs keep a running register, and each number is a person who can see again. A few of them, shared with their consent:
How a gift becomes sight.
Five steps, and the patient pays for none of them.
01
The Donor
After a death, a family agrees to eye donation. An eye bank team recovers the eyes, ideally within six hours.
02
The Eye Bank
The cornea is checked and kept in storage fluid, where it stays usable for about 4 to 14 days.
03
The Patient
Found through Rotary clubs, partner hospitals and word of mouth across Punjab and the states around it.
04
The Surgeon
Operates at a partner hospital, under a signed agreement with the clubs. The operation takes one to two hours.
05
The Check-Up
Follow-up visits watch the graft as it heals, and the case goes into the register under its number.
Every transplant starts with a family’s yes.
Pledge Your EyesIn Partnership With
Plano Metro Rotary ClubDistrict 5810, Plano, Texas, USA
Rotary Club Hoshiarpur Mid TownDistrict 3070, Hoshiarpur, India
Donate Organs, Save LivesFind your country’s donor registry