Posted on May 18, 2004 at 9:05 a.m.

BIRMINGHAM, AL — The UAB (University of Alabama at Birmingham) Department of Ophthalmology will honor the Alabama Eye Bank at a reception during its Annual Clinical and Research Symposium on May 21. In its 35 year history, the Alabama Eye Bank has provided tissue for more than 20,000 corneal transplants.

“Each year, the Alabama Eye Bank retrieves more than 2,000 corneas for transplant or research,” says Dr. Lanning Kline, professor and chair of the UAB Department of Ophthalmology. “With this valuable resource in hand, UAB physicians and scientists can restore the gift of sight to those affected by eye injury or disease, as well as find new ways to prevent and treat diseases of the eye.”

The reception, at 5 p.m. on May 21 at the Callahan Eye Foundation Hospital at UAB, will be followed by a dinner at the Summit, hosted by the Alabama Eye Bank, celebrating “Focused on Sight — 35 Years of Giving the Gift of Sight.” Special guests will include Michael Hettinger, MD, Chairman, Eye Bank Association of America (EBAA), and Patricia Aiken-O'Neill, CEO and President of the Eye Bank Association of America.

Aiken-O’Neill heads the world’s oldest transplant organization. She received a Juris Doctor (JD) degree from the American University Washington College of Law in 1980 and was previously counsel to the American Academy of Ophthalmology.

Hettinger, chair of the Eye Bank Association of America, earned his medical degree in 1975 from the University of Tennessee. He served an ophthalmology residency at UAB and the Callahan Eye Foundation Hospital. He is currently the co-medical director of the Midwest Transplant Network Eye Bank, in Kansas.