The Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California (USC) received $800,000 in funding from the Department of Defense to conduct research that will lead to restored sight for combat troops who have had eye injuries. The result of a funding request submitted by California Rep. Adam B. Schiff, the grant will support the Eye Trauma and Visual Restoration (EyeTVR) program at the school.
With traumatic eye injuries skyrocketing due to the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, the DOD is particularly interested in advances that promise to save sight. Another goal of the EyeTVR program is to save and restore sight to veterans and their family members who suffer from other eye injuries, eye infections or inherited and age-related eye disease. Applications are expected to be available to the civilian population as well. Read the USC press release on the grant.
While this is great news, it underscores the need for a stable and long-term source of funding for trauma research. Like NTI, the EyeTVR program had to appeal to an individual member of Congress in order to secure limited funding for a very important initiative. In fact, NTI’s executive director Sharon Smith just returned from a trip to Washington for the same purpose. She met with staff members in seven different Texas representatives’ offices to state NTI’s case and ask for support in requesting appropriations.
Individual, piecemeal efforts to fund isolated research projects represent a drop in the bucket in terms of the attention needed to make strides in trauma practice. NTI has been lobbying for a steady source of funding even as we work to secure annual funding on a year-to-year basis. We hope other trauma-related research organizations will join us in this quest.