Tennessee Lions Eye Center Outreach

The Lions of Tennessee, Multiple District 12 have teamed up with the Department of Ophthalmology at Vanderbilt Children’s Hospital, committed to a goal of providing quality eye care for children statewide.

Lions Clubs across the state committed to raising over $4 million for an effort named “Operation KidSight”.  This project created the Tennessee Lions Eye Center (TLEC) at Vanderbilt Children’s Hospital, a pediatric ophthalmology center.  The staff consists of pediatric ophthalmologists and others specially trained to provide quality eye care to infants and children.

From the beginning, an important part of this unique partnership has been the Tennessee Lions Eye Center Outreach Program, the “clinic without walls”, a program of free screening of young children in their own neighborhoods, with evaluation and follow-up by professionals at TLEC.

Leading the program are the medical director at TLEC who is responsible for the scientific integrity, and the outreach director who manages implementation of the program.  Trained Lions Club volunteers screen children from 12 months up to 72 months of age in their own neighborhoods at nursery schools, day care centers, kindergartens, Head Start and similar programs.  The purpose of the screening is to detect eye disorders that can lead to serious eye problems and/or blindness, at an early age when treatment is most effective.  The process is very non-invasive which makes it ideal for use with young children.

Lions use an instrument that detect a range of vision disorders, including amblyopia (lazy eye), strabismus (misaligned eyes), anisometropia (unequal refractive power), media opacities (cataracts, etc.), myopia (nearsightedness), hyperopia (farsightedness), and astigmatism (curved lens, light not sharp on the retina).  The instrument’s readings are attached to parent consent forms and sent to Vanderbilt for evaluation by physicians, after which results are transmitted to the parents.  Those screened who have potential eye problems are referred to ophthalmologists or optometrists in their area for a more detailed examination, and TLEC staff follows-up with parents to help ensure those children get care.

The free TLEC Outreach Program has received international recognition, and has been well-received by Tennessee communities from its beginning in June 1997.  This service project resulted in over 642,984 children being screened by Tennessee Lions through 2020, with 5.6% of those children being referred for further evaluation.

By helping ensure that all children in Tennessee have good vision to help them meet their dreams, the Tennessee Lions are fulfilling our mission!


Vision Screening Data

Statewide screening results by calendar year are shown below.

KidSight Outreach Vision Screening Statistics

Year Sessions Screened Referred % Referred
6/1/97-12/31/97 33 980 66 6.73
1998 518 9203 600 6.51
1999 800 13707 738 5.38
2000 766 13873 603 4.34
2001 1114 29371 1327 4.51
2002 930 25392 1164 4.58
2003 1031 27088 1047 3.87
2004 909 25061 1154 4.61
2005 991 28568 1193 4.17
2006 1022 30688 1613 5.26
2007 1045 31998 1736 5.42
2008 1004 34047 2230 6.55
2009 1042 35826 1991 5.59
2010 1185 37903 2149 5.66
2011 1105 38205 1842 4.82
2012 1021 37566 1864 4.96
2013 1145 39472 2025 5.13
2014 956 30810 1627 5.17
2015 887 28264 1696 8.63
2016 864 27968 1658 5.93
2017 895 28720 2210 7.69
2018 900 29,128 2,430 8.34
2019 909 30,375 2,610 8.59
2020 259 8,771 664 7.57
 Total(s) 21,331 642,984 36,214 5.63