Vision Excellence Awards: Lucia Silva

Dr. Lucia is the Medical Director at Visualiza Clinica Medica Oftalmologica, a position that has allowed her to develop and execute clinical, surgical, and quality control protocols to standardize and improve their ophthalmological services. She leads a team that provides a dynamic and progressive training program for its ophthalmologists, associates, and support staff. Through this program, they provide high quality, efficient services to their patients by continual development of their clinical knowledge, and surgical and technical skills.

She is passionate about providing other female ophthalmologists with leadership and decision-making opportunities. She hopes to make this a growing tendency of female empowerment within the eye care profession in Guatemala and around the world. She is a dynamic and tireless advocate for vision care who is equally committed to fostering gender equity in her institution. She is committed to providing the best possible ophthalmic care to all the patients she serves and create innovative ways to reach the isolated and overlooked.

Visualiza has made huge changes in the gender balance in their clinic in the last two years. Today, more than 70% of the organization’s manager positions are women. In partnership with Seva Foundation, Visualiza has the highest surgical volume and efficiency in Central America and the Caribbean. They perform 37% of all cataract surgeries in Guatemala, a country with one of the lowest CSRs in the world. Working with Visualiza has allowed Dr. Lucia to help greatly reduce preventable blindness by performing and training others to perform a high volume of quality surgeries. As a part of the Global Sight Initiative, she has shared her expertise with mentee hospitals, developed cataract and glaucoma training programs, and advised organizations on best practices that she has learned during her time at Visualiza. Dr. Lucia is an inspiration and her knowledge, skill, and passion are an invaluable asset to Seva Foundation, Visualiza, and the communities she serves, and as such we are honored to nominate her for the Vision Excellence Award.