Dr. Geoff Tabin is Co-Founder and Chairman Emeritus of Cure Blindness Project. He is the Fairweather Foundation Endowed Chair and Professor of Ophthalmology and Global Medicine at Stanford University. He has published more than 100 peer-reviewed articles, four books and a dozen book chapters related to his work in ophthalmology and the developing world.
Dr. Tabin is the fourth person in the world to reach the tallest peak on each of the seven continents, with first ascents of rock, ice and mountain climbs on all continents including the first ascent of the (still unrepeated ) East Face of Mt Everest in 1983. His passion for mountain climbing directed him to his professional career in eye care. While working as a doctor in Nepal he witnessed a Dutch team providing the miracle of cataract surgery and watched the transformation as sight, and life, were restored to blind people. He then devoted his career to overcoming needless blindness.
Tabin graduated from Yale University and then earned an MA in Philosophy at Oxford University on a Marshall Scholarship. From there, he took his interest in moral philosophy and health care delivery to Harvard Medical School where he earned his MD in 1985. After completing an ophthalmology residency at Brown University and a fellowship in corneal surgery, under Professor Hugh Taylor, in Melbourne, Australia, Dr. Tabin returned to Nepal to work with Dr. Sanduk Ruit.
Tabin and Nepalese eye surgeon Dr. Sanduk Ruit established Cure Blindness Project in 1995 – with a vow to work to eliminate all preventable and treatable blindness from the Himalayan region in their lifetime, a goal, in Tabin’s words, “more audacious than setting out to make the first assent of the East Face of Mount Everest.” Dr. Ruit, whom the Associated Press heralded as the “god of sight” to the world’s poor, and Tabin have proven that hospital quality standards can be applied in impoverished areas devoid of electricity and clean water. Their successful approach to restoring sight and dogged perseverance has made possible what 25 years ago seemed impossible.
Cure Blindness Project has since expanded beyond the Himalayas to encompass Sub-Saharan Africa. Dr. Tabin spends a considerable part of the year working in the Himalayas and Sub-Saharan Africa.
Tabin is a leader in both the national and international ophthalmic community. He has won the American Academy of Ophthalmology Humanitarian Award, The American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery Chang/Crandall Humanitarian Award, The Dalai Lamas’ Unsung Hero of Compassion Award and received top humanitarian prizes from the ophthalmology societies of India, Nepal and COECSA (the largest pan-African Ophthalmology Society). He serves on the Education Committee for the American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) where he was the recipient of the Senior Honor award and teaches courses on cataract and corneal surgery at both the AAO and the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgeons (ASCRS).
He is author of “Blind Corners “ (Lyons Press) “Second Suns: Two Doctors and Their Amazing Quest to Restore Sight and Save Lives” (Random House), by David Oliver Relin tells the story of Dr. Tabin and Dr. Sanduk Ruit and how they formed the Cure Blindness Project in a quest to overcome needless blindness.
