Dr. Michael Brush: Volunteer Ophthalmologist Spotlight

“I knew about Cure Blindness Project through my friendship with Matt Oliva – he was a year ahead of me in residency at the University of Washington and I was always impressed with the work he was doing.

I started volunteering for Cure Blindness Project in 2016 with my first trip to Ethiopia and returned there in 2017, 2018 and 2019. These trips were a mix of high volume surgery outreach as well as phaco training. COVID prevented me from traveling in 2020 and in 2021.

I had planned to return to Ethiopia but due to the civil conflict Cure Blindness Project asked me to shift my focus to Ghana. I have made 4 trips to Kumasi and the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital (KATH) (with a 5th coming up in May hopefully). I’ve been working with surgeons there to build up their phacoemulsification skills to allow for a sustainable training program for faculty and residents.

I have also been able to have colleagues from my practice in Washington join me on the last two trips to help increase the training. We are able to have two ORs going and get twice as many cases done and increase the exposure for different surgeons.

I work with vendors like Alcon and BVI to provide donated supplies for these training sessions – intraocular lenses, viscoelastic and other surgical equipment necessary to perform safe and efficient cataract surgery. KATH is also working to improve their internal supply chain to better support the training for this method of cataract surgery.

Ultimately, I want to see a program at KATH where there are multiple surgeons comfortable with phacoemulsification who can transfer that knowledge to the future generation of ophthalmologists along with a sustainable supply chain for equipment acquisition. Doing this will improve overall access to care for patients as well as make KATH a center of excellence in Ghana for eye care.”