"It Really Opened my Eyes" says Parent During Vision Care Training

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An Shun's parents were overjoyed to learn that his severe astigmatism could be corrected with glasses

An Shun is a quiet 12-year-old boy from Xiao Long Primary School in Zizhou County. He is a rather special case for us because we rarely run into a child with such severe astigmatism. He can hardly see the facial features of the classmate sitting beside him, let alone any writing on the blackboard!

Just like many parents in rural China, Shun’s parents had never heard about myopia or astigmatism. Two years ago, An Shun started to realize the change in his eyesight as his vision became more and more blurry. He tried to tell his parents what was happening, but they said his eyes looked normal and did not give it much more thought.

Fortunately, they were among the parents that the REAP/OneSight “Seeing is Learning” team gathered for parental education concerning eye health. First, they watched a short video explaining the signs of myopia, the causes, and the benefits of wearing eyeglasses. Then, to help reinforce the message, they also watched a PowerPoint presentation and received informational pamphlets. Seeing blurry photos mimicking what An Shun sees day-to-day was especially helpful to his mother who has perfect vision and had trouble relating to her son’s condition. “It really opened my eyes,” she said.

Afterwards, when An Shun’s father was asked if he had changed his mind about his son’s eye problem, he said, “Before today, I did not understand what my son was suffering from. Now that we know it’s a real problem, his mother and I will do everything we can to fix his eyesight. We don’t want this to hold him back in school.”

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A page from the Parental Vision Care Training Pamphlet - seeing blurry photos mimicking the world through her son's eyes was especially helpful for An Shun's mother

“Before today, I did not understand what my son was suffering from. Now that we know it’s a real problem, his mother and I will do everything we can to fix his eyesight. We don’t want this to hold him back in school.”