Special-edition, Congolese-inspired TOMS Shoes
We're teaming up with Giving Partner Eastern Congo Initiative (ECI), an advocacy and grant-making organization founded by Ben Affleck, on two Congolese-inspired designs with an additional give. Read More >>
TOMS x charity: water - An Eyewer collaboration
TOMS and charity: water, an organization founded in 2006 (like TOMS!) that’s dedicated to to helping bring clean and safe drinking water to people in developing nations, join forces for the first-ever TOMS Eyewear collab! Read More >>
Giving TOMS Shoes in the DRC
Founded by Ben Affleck in 2010, ECI is an advocacy and grant-making organization that works with and for the people of DRC, the third most populous country in Africa, and one that struggled under a cycle of violence for nearly 20 years – particularly in the east. Read More >>
- Category:
Giving sight with LAICO in India
Your TOMS Eyewear purchase supports our Giving Partners in their work to save and restore sight to people in need through their case-by-case, expert provision of medical treatment, surgery or prescription glasses.
With each Giving Partner, we work a bit differently, depending on the needs of the people they serve, and where they serve them. What do we mean?
Sight Giving Partner, the organization that links TOMS + eye care providers in the regions where we give: Lions Aravind Institute for Community Ophthalmology (LAICO)
Community Partner, one of the local organizations LAICO helps us reach, which provides the eye care services locally: Grace Vision Netralaya
In India, where we help Giving Partner Grace Vision reach patients around Sambalpur, Western Odisha, support from TOMS Eyewear purchases has allowed for…
-The provision of more services in more (and often more remote) locations.
In the hot summer months, people are less likely to travel, and since distance can be an obstacle between a person and the services he/she needs, summer can be slow for eye care provision to people in need. Backed by the resources unlocked by your TOMS Eyewear, Grace Vision “had the freedom to move into under-served areas to our own choosing. This has helped enhance our service volumes…and enhanced our geographic coverage to remote, inaccessible areas.”
-More refractive error corrections (in other words, issues resolved with prescription glasses).
The Grace Vision team reported that the glasses will “improve [recipients’] visual acuity and [help them] live a meaningful, productive, and better-quality life.”
-New open doors at a “Septic Operation Theatre,” where Grace Vision can specifically treat patients with infected eyes.
Grace Vision has long identified the need for a special operating facility to treat septic, or infected, eyes. “We came across [septic eyes] so often among the poor and deprived population in the countryside and in urban slums.” The TOMS + LAICO partnership that supports Grace Vision’s local work helped provide the means for the organization to set up the Theatre to treat patients with infected eyes.
These additions to Grace Vision’s resources help in the short-term, empowering them to reach more people today. But they are also part of Grace Vision’s long-term investment strategy in their own sustainability. The more patients Grace Vision can reach with services, the more word spreads – among rich, middle class, and poor patients – about the availability of quality eye care. Over time, this increased patient traffic includes more paying patients, which means a sustainable source of income for Grace Vision.
And though all these are developments we’re proud and excited to be a part of, it’s through the lens of those who can see again that we’re motivated to plow ahead on this One for One journey…
Learn more about how TOMS Eyewear is helping give way to these kinds of opportunities…
-
rastalover350814 likes this
-
toms posted this
