Preservation and Restoration of Vision:

Vision for the Future, Part 2: Ophthalmic Education and Training - Task Force on Ophthalmology Resident and Specialist Training in Ophthalmology

Ronald E. Smith, MD

The Task Force on Ophthalmology Resident and Specialist Training in Ophthalmology of The International Ophthalmology Strategic Plan to Preserve and Restore Vision - Vision for the Future, appointed by the International Council of Ophthalmology and Academia Ophthalmologica Internationalis, recognizes that there are 45 million blind people worldwide with an additional 135 million visually handicapped.

The need for eye care specialists, especially in some developing countries, is critical.

The task force is focused on the training curricula required to educate specialists in ophthalmology, while recognizing the great variations in social and economic status of regions of the world, and the urgency of the need to eliminate avoidable blindness. The task force will develop general principles and guidelines for the education of the ophthalmologists.

The task force recommends a spectrum of training requirements, depending on geographic locations, for different regions of the world. Furthermore, the necessity for ophthalmic surgeons may be so urgent in certain regions that an ophthalmic surgeon may be trained in an expedited fashion.

Accordingly, the task force is reviewing training curricula from different continents and different geographic locations and will recommend to the International Council of Ophthalmology the educational requirements for training of specialists in ophthalmology.

July 7, 2000

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Also see: Table of Contents for Vision for the Future