Arvind Eye Hospitals

Aravind Eye Hospital offers an inspirational experience

Third-year resident gains valuable experience during month-long surgical rotation in India

Publish date: Sep 1, 2006 By: Parag Parekh, MD, MPA Source: Ophthalmology Times ____________________________________________________________

___ July 8, 2006. My wife and I had been in the city of Madurai in southern India for just a few days when we read the news in the morning paper—Dr. Govindappa Venkataswamy (Dr. V), founder of the world-renowned Aravind Parag Parekh, MD, MPA Eye Hospital, had passed away.

By coincidence, July 8th was also the day I was moving into Aravind's guest house for a month-long surgical rotation. On that sun-scorched Saturday, we rushed to find any white clothing we had (the traditional color to wear at a funeral) and headed to Dr. V's house to pay our respects. Located just steps from the guesthouse, Dr. V's house was overrun with mourners, crowding the vestibule and flowing into the street. Unsure of the proper etiquette in such a situation, I luckily found a friendly face—Dr. Prajna, the Director of Medical Education at Aravind, my contact person for this rotation, and Dr. V's nephew. He invited me into the house where Dr. V's body lay in a Dr. Venkataswamy, glass-enclosed casket, surrounded by friends and family. founder of Aravind Before his body was driven to a nearby park for Eye Hospital cremation, I had the honor of saying goodbye to this giant of ophthalmology, a servant of humanity and role model to me.

Flashback to 5 years ago. I was a first-year student in grad school; it was in my Strategic Management class that I came across a Harvard Business School case study: Aravind Eye Hospital. At the time, I knew that I wanted to become an ophthalmologist, and was inspired as I read about Dr. V's idealistic (some might say "crazy") venture that started out as an 11-bed hospital in 1976 (financed by a mortgage on his house because he could find no donors), and became the...