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Welcome to The ORIA website! |
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The Ophthalmic Research Institute of Australia (ORIA) is a non-profit organisation dedicated to promoting research into the nature and cause of eye disease and the prevention of blindness.
The ORIA receives no funding from Government sources and yet, since 1984 alone, has contributed around $A6.7million to this type of research.
The ORIA was founded in 1953 by a group of ophthalmologists concerned with the need to advance eye research in Australia. The Institute’s first major project was to assist in the founding of the first Chair of Ophthalmology in Australia, which was established in Melbourne, and has since played a major role in eye research. The ORIA is now the research arm of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Ophthalmologists whilst maintaining its own independent corporate structure.
The grants are made available through its invested funds which have accumulated by way of bequests and donations and contributions from Fellows of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Ophthalmologists. Quite recently funds have also been distributed on behalf of outside organisations such as Glaucoma Australia Inc and the Eye Foundation. Grants awarded each year have enabled many ophthalmologists and those scientists in related fields, to enrich Australian medicine and surgery through their contribution to clinical practice, medical education and to medical research. A large proportion of these funds come from people whose sight has been saved as a result of modern eye treatment, and who wish to express their appreciation in a tangible way.
Grants are made annually to research workers in all fields of eye disease throughout Australia. These applications are considered by the Research Advisory Committee - after input from independent outside assessors - which decides on the merit of the project and the individual with original ideas so that institutions and workers are supported.
In 1993 it held the first Australasian Ophthalmic and Visual Science meeting. This is a meeting for clinical and laboratory based researchers to present and discuss their work. It is the only such meeting of its type in Australia and has modelled itself on the very successful ARVO meeting in the United States.
ORIA founded the Gift of Sight in 1994 to promote public awareness of eye disease and to raise funds for eye research in Australia. The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Ophthalmologists (RANZCO) Eye Foundation was established in 2002 with a mission to raise and invest funds for research programs. The RANZCO Eye Foundation continues the awareness raising work of the Gift of Sight Society, which has been amalgamated with the Foundation.
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