Did you know that 285 million people are visually impaired, 39 million of them blind? About 90% of the world’s visually impaired people live in developing countries, where there is a critical shortage of skilled eye care personnel and a pressing need to build human resource capacity.

Translating the Community Eye Health Journal (CEHJ) helps in the fight against blindness

Since 2010, The Rosetta Foundation has been providing translations for the Spanish edition of the Community Eye Health Journal (CEHJ). The CEHJ is a free publication which is translated into French, Spanish and Chinese and reaches nearly 27,000 eye care workers in low- and middle-income countries. It provides up-to-date and practical eye care information to eye care personnel in underserved cities, towns, villages and rural areas across the developing world who have a little or no access to refresher training, libraries or the Internet.

The Spanish edition of the CEHJ is struggling to continue to publish the journal in Spanish for eye care workers in Latin America, and The Rosetta Foundation agreed to take it on as a project. “Last year, the first Rosetta Foundation-translated Spanish edition appeared, and we are continuing with a second edition this year”, says the Editor of the CEHJ, Elmien W. Ellison.

The Rosetta Foundation and the CEHJ worked in close collaboration to ensure the translations were of high quality. “The Latin American editorial team of CEHJ set a test translation and then chose the translators who performed best”, remembers Ellison, who highlights that it’s a great idea to harness the energy of young translators, because it also allows them to gain experience and become experts in a particular area. The positive result of this experience has been reflected in the beginning of a new project for a second Spanish edition of the journal. “I would heartily recommend the Rosetta Foundation for anyone who is looking to make their content available to more people”, concludes Ellison.

Translating the Community Eye Health Journal (CEHJ) helps in the fight against blindness

The CEHJ, which is published by the International Centre for Eye Health, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (UK), combines procedural and clinical articles with a public health focus. The target audience consists of nurses, doctors, ophthalmic nurses, ophthalmologists and optometrists, many of whom work in isolated and rural areas, where up-to-date information is difficult to access.

According to the CEHJ 2010 reader survey, 90% of readers say that the journal has improved the way they work and treat patients, and 90% of readers also use the Journal to teach others, whether eye care colleagues, students, patients, or the community at large. And each copy is passed on to an average of 9 other readers, further increasing the Journal’s impact.

Raquel Ligero