Fred Hollows Intraocular Lens Laboratory has not only met domestic demands, but is also becoming competitive in the world market with 73.5% of its product being exported to Asian countries and 22.5% to countries in Africa, Europe, Oceania and Americas; the rest being used in Eritrea, says Mr. Mengisteab Tewoldeberhan, manager of the Laboratory.

The Fred Hollows Intraocular Laboratory was established in 1994 by the Fred Hollows Foundation with the objective of manufacturing high-quality low-cost Intraocular Lenses later certified by international accreditation bodies in 2000. The foundation named after Professor Fred Hollows, a prominent Australian ophthalmologist and honorary citizen of the State of Eritrea, demonstrated a unique solidarity with the Eritrean people’s armed struggle for independence in the medical field. Not only did he give medications to trachoma and cataract victims during that time and later post independence periods, but also pioneered the way for an advanced and well equipped intraocular laboratory in Eritrea.

Committed to meeting the needs of the cataract blinds in Eritrea, the Fred Hollows IOL Laboratory provides intraocular lenses to Berhan Eye Hospital on its endeavors to facilitate on the eradication of cataract blindness. The lenses worth 90.00 Nakfa each, has been of great significance to cataract patients says Dr. Desbele Mehari, Director of Berhan Eye Hospital.

The laboratory currently operates in three shifts and manufactures more than 200,000 IOL lenses annually. So far, the laboratory has produced two types of intraocular lens and globally over 1 million people have become beneficiaries of the products.

The laboratory was intentionally over engineered in order to guarantee the highest quality of manufacturing facility and finished products that would exceed world class standards. It was designed for the production of single piece posterior chamber intra ocular lenses and other sterile medical devices. The plant floor plan, structural design, materials of construction, environmental controls are specifically designed to minimize biological and particulate contamination during the manufacturing of IOL’s.

All manufacturing operations are conducted in Class M5.5 clean rooms while finished products packaging is conducted in Class M 3.5 laminar flow workstations.

The IOL with a total number of 60 professionals maintains high commitment to the ongoing staff development and training ensuring that the manufacturing facilities continue to meet the demands of world class production and management standards. The laboratory is equipped with the state of the art IOL manufacturing software developed by the Fred Hollows Foundation Research and Development Engineers. The FH 2000 lathe eliminated the manual ways of production and it boosts the out put and quality of IOL of higher optical dimensional accuracy than those of the lenses produced on the basis of traditional technology.

The FHL, an autonomous entity and run by its incomes, is under the auspices of the Ministry of Health. It has more than 300 standard operating procedures where by every step of the manufacturing process is monitored. The two models of intraocular lenses produced by the FHL, namely FH 105 and FH 106 are dry lenses of 45 kinds manufactured with a difference of 0.5 diopter ranging from 8.0 to 30.0. Medical professionals pick out the befitting lenses in accordance with the diopter of the patient.

Mr. Mengisteab explained that the quality of the products undergoes quality control by various local and international quality control institutions, and that the product’s quality and effectiveness is making it competitive in the world market. Fred Hollows Intraocular Lens- Eritrea Laboratory which is the first of its kind in Africa, is ISO (International Standard Organization) 13488 and ISO 9001 certified by UK based Societe Generale de Surveillance (SGS), a certifying body that verifies compliance with the highest European and International Standard of Good Manufacturing Practices for medical devices. As a result the IOL laboratory won a Gold Medal Award for Excellence and Business Prestige from Business Initiative Directories, BID in a Quality Summit held in New York in 2003.

Mr. Mengisteab further went on to say that the Fred Hallows Intraocular Lens Laboratory has already introduced the necessary equipments and is offering training to staff members to produce advanced ‘foldable’ intraocular lenses. A study has also been finalized towards producing eye drop medicine.

Apart from the obvious loss of confidence and quality of life for those living with visual impairment, blindness creates an economic burden on family members and society in general. But the thing worth noticing is the fact that people with cataract blindness could regain their sight with simple and cost effective surgery.

According to WHO reports 3.4% of world population is cataract blind and 90% of them live in the Third World countries. The treatment available for the cure of cataract blindness is among the most successful and cost effective ways of averting blindness. With Fred Hollows Intra Ocular laboratory, Eritrea will meet the goals of Vision 2020 before that time.