"THE THEATRE"

“THE THEATRE”

By J.L. Gupta

THE theatre? Where the actors act? The stage where the dramas are staged? Where anyone can pay and see the play. No! It is the place where an ophthalmologist operates. No unwanted visitor. Not free for all. Only for the patient. The person whose eyes need attention. He who has to undergo surgery. It is neat and clean. Free from fungus. Bereft of all bacteria. Thanks to the good doctor. I was allowed access. And what an experience!

The eye is a fine part of human constitution. It lays the whole world bare before us. It is the "pulse of the soul". A window to man's mind. Sometimes, an eye does more work than the two hands. It makes silence more eloquent than speech. When the tongue makes "offence", the eye can "heal it up". The feelings, the human emotions and the thoughts can be seen in the two tiny orbits.

And what a marvel of sensory reception is this visual apparatus. Enclosed in a socket - made up of "portions of several of the bones of the skull", it has "1,000,000 optic nerve fibres and at least 150,000,000 receptors". The retina that receives light and converts it into chemical ener­gy for transmission to the brain has "about 7,000,000 cones and from 75,000,000 to 150,000,000 rods". It has a protective mechanism - the first line being provided by the lid. It has the secretary organs, which function according to need. And yet it is subject to disease and disorder. One of the common problems being the cataract.

The human eye has a lens. It is transparent. It is vascular. An elastic capsule surrounds it. It lies behind the pupil. Its "transparency is the result of the regular arrangement of the lens fibers" which are being formed continuously. When there is inter­ference, abnormal fibers that cannot transmit light begin to grow. Opacity appears. When it affects vision, it is called cataract. And thanks to the bio­technological progress, it can be extracted as soon as it interferes with the normal human activity. One does not have to wait for it to "mature". And I have seen two extractions. At some interval of time. The gap was not too long. Just a few years.

What a change within a short time. On the first occasion,, after administering the anesthesia, etc, the sur­geon proceeded to give a nick with a scalpel that had a diamond edge. The opaque lens was scraped and scooped out. The area was cleaned. The intra-ocular lens was inserted through the nick and adjusted. The cut was then stitched. There were three sutures. A dressing to provide quicker healing for the incision. And, finally removal of the sutures. In all, it took about two weeks before the patient felt normal.

And now? It was a different story. No scalpel. No incision. Only a fine needle attached to what may, in a layman's language, be described as a machine. It is inserted into the area. No blood. The cataract is emulsified and sucked out. You can see it disappearing fast on the monitor attached to the surgical microscope being used by the surgeon. And through the same needle, the lens is inserted. No stitches or sutures. No dressing. After being kept under observation for a short- while, you are permit­ted to go home. One looks normal. Next day, you can attend to your daily routine. Sometimes, even spectacles may not be needed. Normal vision. What a relief! Life seems worth living all over again.

The few moments around this theatre were real­ly more satisfying than in any other. Even educa­tive. While driving back, a thought crossed the mind. Why does man make bombs and bombers when he can make machines to reduce human suffering? Why should the world be a theatre of war when we can have such theatres for human care and cure? Probably some day man shall!