Donating just $1 can give patients sunglasses to
 aid in their recovery

• My name is Sonal Patel. I am a senior. For Girl Scout gold award project I decided to involve SEF and collect money to give to the Sankara Eye Hospital in Coimbatore, India. I first heard about SEF through a slide show that I saw at a dance performance which was hosted by SEF. Their goal for 20/20 vision by the year 2020 grabbed my attention and after finding out more about the organization I decided this worthwhile cause was something I could revolve my project around.

• Opposite are some pictures of my recent visit to Coimbatore, India. On the first picture I am in blue shirt (left), next to me in the grey shirt is my sister. Here we are handing out sunglasses to a discharged patient. The second picture is of 3 patients who received sunglasses before leaving. The last picture is a group picture of me with the group of patients who received sunglasses.

• I wanted to find out what the hospital needed other then the things it was already receiving. I found out that after the eye surgeries the patients needed sunglasses, but these were not provided by the hospital. I decided to focus my efforts on raising money so that each patient could also receive sunglasses. After the surgery, the patients eyes are sensitive to light so the sunglasses are an essential part of the recovery process.

• I was able to raise $1000 which provided the 1000 patients with a pair of sunglasses. Rather then a one time thing, I wanted to make this an ongoing project. To donate towards providing patients sunglasses, please click on the 'Donate Now' button here and in the 'Designation' field specify 'Sunglass Project'.