Nkoranza (B/A) Feb. 9 GNA- The Brong-Ahafo Regional chapter of the Ghana Red Cross Society has organized a one day workshop in Nkoranza to educate 40 school health officers from six selected districts in the region on primary eye care techniques.
The participants, drawn from Nkoranza, Wenchi, Kintampo North and South, Tain districts and the Techiman municipal assembly were school health education programme coordinators, peripatetic officers and school health teachers.
Madam Kate Manu, ophthalmic nurse at the Holy Family Hospital, at Techiman emphasized that the eye was an important organ of the body that needed to be well taken care of.
She advised the health teachers to educate parents to monitor children's activities to ensure that they did not damage their eyes. Madam Manu cautioned nursing mothers against the application of breast milk, seawater or salt to the eye their babies but to report any eye problem to the nearest health center.
She also advised the public against the use of herbal concoctions and the mixture of capsules for the treatment of eye ailments as they stood the risk of damaging their eyes.
Mr. Solomon Gayoni, regional secretary of the Red Cross Society, urged the participants to study eye problems among the people and report them to the nearest health facility for attention.
He said the Society was established by a Swiss National, Mr. Jean Henry Dunart in 1859 with the objective of helping to alleviate the suffering of people with eye ailments.
The regional secretary said since 1958 the Society in the country had been rendering voluntary services to promote the health of the people.
Mr. Djan Kwasi, Nkoranza district SHEP coordinator, on behalf of the participants commended the organizers of the workshop and promised that they would not fail to impart the knowledge they had acquired to other health teachers in the communities.
Topics treated at the workshop included fundamental principles of the Red Cross Society, integration of primary eye care into school health education programme, anatomy and physiology of the eye, common eye diseases, as well as types of eye injuries and their prevention.
