Lucknow, Nov 26 : The ophthalmology department of King George's Medical University (KGMU) has achieved the milestone of conducting over 1,000 corneal transplants in a year. The feat, attained in 10 months, is almost double of the transplants done last year. According to official sources, KGMU's eye bank, run under the ophthalmology department, conducted 1,035 transplants despite challenges posed by the Covid-19 pandemic. The doctors were successful in providing eyesight to more than 1,000 visually impaired people. Data also shows that there has been a steady increase in corneal transplants by the department -- from 20 in 2016 to about 367 in 2017, around 707 in 2018 and about 767 in 2019. The number, however, dropped to 598 in 2020 because of the hurdles created by the pandemic. The record growth has been made possible by two factors -- increase in eye donation due to awareness among people and efficiency in cornea retrieval and transplantation by the KGMU's ophthalmology department. The 1,000th transplant was performed on a 56-year-old woman from Gonda, who was suffering from retinopathy. "She had lost her eyesight due to retinopathy triggered by diabetes nearly two years ago. On the test, we found that her optic nerves were functioning and she had a sense of light and darkness," said Prof Arun Kumar, director of KGMU eye bank. He said, "The transplant was performed nearly a month ago and her sight has started to come back. As of now, we get an operation theatre for transplant for a day in a week in which we take up three-four cases. With dedicated OT and increase in staff, we can conduct procedures thrice a week, benefitting at least eight-ten patients." With 1,401 donations already made this year so far, KGMU is recording impressive growth in cornea donation over the year. However, doctors say that though there has been a rise in donations over the years, it is not enough because demand is huge. "We not only transplant corneas at our centre, but also provide them to other government medical institutions," said Prof Arun Kumar. He asked families to honour the eye donation pledge of their relatives after death. /IANS