Over the past 60 years, Bosch has created a space for itself in the society not just as a technology and innovation pioneer, but also as a company that ‘cares’. Bosch’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) aims to make a difference in the communities in which it operates. Bosch India Foundation, one of the social engagement pillars drives a Holistic Village Development Program (HVDP) across 8 major locations in India. Health care is one of the thrust areas. In this context, Bosch has identified Lions Aravind Institute of Community Ophthalmology (LAICO) to coordinate cataract surgery programme as part of its CSR Programme. The programme aims to provide 870 free cataract surgeries for the identified persons living in BOSCH adopted villages through Aravind Eye Hospitals in Tamil Nadu and LAICO’s partner eye hospitals in other parts of India. In total, 249 villages have been identified by Bosch for this programme, which are located in the vicinity of their manufacturing plants in the districts of Tirunelveli, Coimbatore, Chennai, Nasik, Bangalore, Ahmedabad, Pune and Jaipur.  The programme implementation period is from September 2020 to March 2021. Following is the list of implementing organisations:

1. Aravind Eye Hospital – Tirunelveli, Tamil Nadu
2. Aravind Eye Hospital – Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu
3. Aravind Eye Hospital – Chennai, Tamil Nadu
4. Bangalore West Lions Super Speciality Eye Hospital, Bangalore, Karnataka
5. Jaipur Calgary Eye Hospital – Jaipur, Rajasthan
6. Porecha Eye Hospital, Ahmedabad, Gujarat, Ahmedabad, Gujarat
7. PBMA’s H. V. Desai Eye Hospital, Pune, Maharashtra
8. Kalpataru Lions eye hospital, Nasik, Maharashtra
9. Tulsi Eye Hospital – Nasik, Maharashtra

As part of the LEAP collaborative series, LAICO has rolled out an 8-monthcollaborative series on the topic “Community Referral System” for its partner hospitals from Lavelle, GSI and HCI projects. A total of 17 hospitals have shown interest and registered in the series. The programme aims to create access to eye care through strengthening community outreach.

LAICO is planning to roll out 12-month collaborative series for eye hospitals aspiring to get NABH entry level certification. The series starts from February 2020 and 10 hospitals will be enrolled in the first series. In order to develop internal capacity to handle sessions in this series, Aravind team attended Certified Professionals for Quality Implementation in Hospitals (CPQIH) COURSE organised by Consortium of Accredited Healthcare Organisations (CAHO) from December 1-3, 2020.