The ophthalmology department of Moncloa Hospital, OFTALVIST, a center of medical excellence and member of Top Doctors, has successfully operated at Moncloa Hospital on a patient from Burkina Faso for thyroid orbitopathy in collaboration with the NGOs Stop Ceguera and Visió Sense Fronteres. Dr. Alvaro Arbizu, a member of Top Doctors, has participated in successfully practicing the oculoplastic and reconstructive surgery to the patient.
Ophthalmology nurse at the Bobo Dioulasso Do Hospital in Burkina Faso, the 40-year-old patient, who has three children, has been trained as a “Cataract Surgeon”, a qualification she obtained under the tutelage of the international organizations Stop Ceguera and Visió Sense Fronteres during a year in Gambia, which has allowed her to become responsible for most of the eye interventions and cataract surgeries performed in the country.
The NGOs, which have been collaborating with the patient’s hospital in Burkina Faso since 2007, aim to promote development campaigns through health and visual promotions, as well as any other activity related to international cooperation, achieving to date more than 2,000 eye interventions, mainly cataract surgery.
A year ago, the patient was diagnosed with hyperthyroidism, which has caused changes in her physiognomy and retraction of the upper eyelid, in addition to an elevation of intraocular pressure that has not subsided with medication. Due to the fact that in the last months she has lost a lot of visual field and the medical treatment has not stopped the evolution of the disease, from the medical-surgical department of OFTALVIST, integrated in the Moncloa Hospital, it was decided to bring her to Spain to admit her in order to perform an orbital decompression in the operating room.
Dr. José Luis Rodríguez Prats, one of the OFTALVIST ophthalmologists involved in the project as coordinator at Visió Sense Fronteres, pointed out that “the project would not be possible without the invaluable help of the patient who since 2011 has been doing the work of selecting patients, as well as carrying out medium and long-term postoperative work, even operating when we are not there, so we are very happy about her recovery.”