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MEDICAL tourists looking for a cornea transplant here can look forward to an increased supply when the National Eye Bank of Sri Lanka (NEBSL) officially opens next Wednesday. The centre in Colombo is expected to get about 1,000 corneas each year from dead patients at the National Hospital of Sri Lanka located close by. About 80 per cent of these corneas can be exported to countries in Asia including Singapore, while the rest will be used in Sri Lanka.
The NEBSL is set up by the Singapore Eye Bank (SEB) and the Sri Lankan Ministry of Health. It is funded by part of a $5 million donation which the Lee Foundation here gave the SEB. Professor Donald Tan, medical director of the SEB and also the Singapore National Eye Centre, said at a press briefing yesterday that there are plans for the NEBSL to get corneas from two other hospitals in Sri Lanka later.
Since operations began in mid-January, 27 corneas have been collected. Prof Tan said this figure surpassed his expectations. Sri Lanka has one of the highest eye donation rates in the world. There is a severe lack of donor corneal tissue across Asia with waiting lists numbering up to the thousands in countries such as Thailand. Every year, about 350 cornea transplant operations are performed here, half of them for foreign patients. Singaporeans are usually allocated corneas from Singaporeans, or they can source for them from the United States or the Philippines.
Last year, 143 Singaporeans donated their corneas. Foreigners who come here for operations usually import them from mainly the US and the Philippines. Corneas from NEBSL cost between US$800 and US$1,500 (S$1,025 and S$1,920), significantly lower than those procured from the US and the Philippines which can cost up to $4,000.
The corneas used here are not kept for more than seven days after they are harvested, to ensure they stay fresh. But corneas from the US take five to seven days to arrive in Asia. Patients in Asia should be able to receive the corneas from Sri Lanka within a day after they are harvested, said Prof Tan.
Indonesian businessman Kalfin Rusli Lie, 52, is among the foreigners who come here for cornea transplants. He has been warded at the Singapore General Hospital since Sunday, urgently waiting for a suitable cornea. He began losing vision in his left eye 10 days ago due to secondary infection that developed because of a shingles infection. His cornea will be sourced from the US or the Philippines. He said in Hokkien: “It is always good for patients to get treated faster.”
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