On Saturday, the Globe and Mail published a two-page feature "A Clear Vision for Better Health" about cataract surgery on Vancouver Island.

Line of blind women patients going for cataract surgery in India

The article was about streamlining the surgical process by following the Toyota Production System to make cataract surgery faster and cheaper and to save our health care dollars. Using this model, Royal Jubilee Hospital has increased its cataract surgical rate from 2,800 in 2003 to 3,900 surgeries in 2008. Here at Seva we know all about CSR -- cataract surgical rates. Our mission is to create high-volume, high-quality, low-cost, sustainable eye care programs in the developing world. The gold standard for efficient cataract surgery is our partner in India -- Aravind Eye Care System.

A line of women cataract patients in India

With Seva's help and with funding from CIDA, the Canadian International Development Agency, Aravind has become the most productive eye care centre in the world in terms of surgical volume and number of patients treated. In 2008, Aravind's network of 5 hospitals saw over 2.7 million patients and performed over 300,000 surgeries (over 200,000 of them cataract surgeries). A cataract surgery can be performed in about 5 minutes. It's a good enough model for Professor Yunus, the economist and Nobel Prize winner, who is using some of his funds to build a network of eye hospitals in Bangladesh. Teams of eye specialists from Bangladesh are now being trained at Aravind. So move over Toyota! You're fine for cars, but if Canadians are looking for a health care revolution in eye care, they should look at Seva's partner in India.