Role of communities in decision-making eye care programs

The concept of primary health care involves educating people to live their lives in ways beneficial to their health. Communities as a whole must participate in the decision-making that is involved in such education, be it promotive, preventive, curative, or rehabilitative. I refer to this participation as "participatory communication." It is based on two fundamental tenets: 1) Everyone in a community has some special knowledge to contribute to the development of the health of that community; and 2) No person is superior to another. Subsequent to sociological and anthropological studies of communities in the Southern Sudan by the Norwegian Church Aid, the Norwegian Association of the Blind and Partially-Sighted conducted village workshops based on this concept.