August 12, 2023, was an important day in the field of ophthalmology – and also community – service in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. The spacious Humo Arena bustled with 113 families, all of whom had children with Down syndrome. Out of these, 63 children met the age criteria and were screened for keratoconus.
Spearheading the event was the indomitable Nikki Hafezi, CEO of the ELZA Institute and the Chief Executive Officer of the National Eye Institute, Tashkent, Uzbekistan. Under her supervision, the event proved to be a great success, with 13 suspected cases of keratoconus identified.
Keratoconus stands out as the leading cause of preventable blindness in children and adolescents. It starts as a weakening of the cornea, which then causes the development of a cone-shaped protrusion. This causes vision to become myopic, with more astigmatism. As the disease progresses, vision gets worse, and further vision problems start to occur, like double or triple vision, ghosting, and blurriness.
Treatment with corneal cross-linking typically stops the disease for progressing further, but this does not normally recover lost vision. This makes it crucial to detect and treat keratoconus early to save these children’s sight.
Community screening events like this one are therefore very important in achieving this. Children with Down syndrome have a greatly elevated risk of developing keratoconus, which is the reason for this screening event focused on children with Down Syndrome.
The support for this event poured in from throughout the community, with the local volunteers, medical professionals, and several companies coming together in solidarity with this event’s mission. Heartfelt thanks go to all those associated with the Tashkent International Medical Center, the MESCA Foundation, the Light for Sight Foundation, and everyone working on Project 21. Their support ensured that the event not only ran smoothly but also achieved its primary goal: early keratoconus detection to prevent blindness in children.
On August 12, 2023, at Humo Arena, Tashkent, 63 Down syndrome children were screened for keratoconus under Nikki Hafezi’s leadership.
