EASTERN PROVINCE

BUGESERA — A team of German medical doctors yesterday donated spectacles worth about US$15,000 to Nyamata Hospital in the Bugesera district.

The 15 specialised doctors who returned to Germany last evening were in the country at the invitation of Plan Rwanda International, from February 23.

While in the country they camped at Ngarama Hospital, in Gatsibo district where they offered free treatment for different ailments to residents.

Francois Twiringirimana, a clinical officer at Nyamata Hospital who received the spectacles, said the donation was timely.

"We have been recommending glasses to people with visual defects but we didn’t have them. We shall now be able to provide them without referring them elsewhere,” he said.

The hospital receives at least 20 eye patients daily, he added. According to him, the most common eye diseases include cataracts, allergic conjunctivitis, glocoma and myopia.

At least 114 people with eye defects were last year operated there, Twiringirimana disclosed, explaining that the operations were carried out in conjunction with doctors from Kanombe Hospital.

Deogratius Cyrill Chuwa, who represented Plan Rwanda Country Director, Dr. Mamadou Kante at the function, explained that the donated glasses were part of what was left after treating Gatsibo residents, and they found it suitable to help Nyamata Hospital.

Meanwhile, before wrapping up their visit, the doctors later visited Nyamata Genocide Memorial Site to offer respect to victims of the 1994 Genocide, against the Tutsi.

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