Forty-odd post-graduate students at the Aravind Eye Hospital (AEH) started the New Year wearing a different hat. They donned the role of salespersons and helped a group of visually challenged women sell products they made.
As much as it is about advances in science and technology, medicine is also about a deep human connection and empathy, according to Dr Venkatesh Prajna, Director (Medical Education) and architect of the Residents Social Responsibility Programme (RRP) at AEH. “But life balance skills are not taught in our medical education,” he adds.
The medicos who come from all over the country for the senior residency programme usually spend the day in the hospital attending to the medical needs of the visually-challenged. “ I try to sensitise them to the non-medical needs of their patients by engaging them in such activities,” he says.
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Venkatesh encourages the students to give their time, and not just money. The social responsibility calendar runs parallel to the academic schedule. Doctors choose the work they want to do but only during their regular working hours and not on Sundays or off-days. From feeding the abandoned on the streets, to giving tuitions to children at orphanages, spending time with the senior citizens at old age homes, distributing school uniforms, toys, school bags and notebooks to less-privileged children, the connect can be through anything.
Whatever work they opt for, the resident doctors have to raise the money to fulfil the task. Usually, they contribute ₹200 every month from their monthly stipend of ₹30,000 and Venkatesh gives an equal contribution matching the donated amount. The initiative is voluntary and rarely has a student opted out.
A creative response from these visits is Vaanavil, an exhibition-cum-sale of products made by the visually challenged. “The emotional support we are able to give them has been the driving force of the exhibition for last eight years,” says Harini, manning a counter selling bed sheets at Vaanavil-2019.
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The doctors helped in the sale of products worth ₹2.75 lakhs this year and the proceeds will go to the Rehabilitation Centre for Blind Women in Mannarpuram, Tiruchirapalli. Products ranged from table cloths, bed spreads, dining sheets, pillow cases, baskets made with plastic wire, cloth bags of different sizes to door mats, towels, mittens, in-skirts, incense sticks, candles, nightwear and stationery items.
With the recent ban on plastic, cloth bags and baskets did good sales. Some of the women gave a demonstration of their tailoring, basket weaving and incense stick making skills. They often find it difficult to sell their products even if of good quality, so the doctors helped them market their products.
“It is a rewarding experience for us to celebrate the dignity of labour, build hope for the less fortunate and see life beyond ophthalmology,” says another doctor.
The members of the rehab centre wait for this exhibition because nowhere else they sell such high volumes in a day. “We work extra hours ahead of this sale as it is a good source of revenue for us,” says Devani V. “We feel happy to come here because we are treated as equals by the doctors,” she adds.
The exhibition is held in LAICO every year and is sought after by school and college students as well as staff of other hospitals. “Everybody who participates touches a life in a way,” says Venkatesh.