Samsung Electronics is repurposing older smartphones to enable greater access to ophthalmic health care in underserved communities around the world. Samsung partnered with the International Agency for the Prevention of Blindness (IAPB) and Yonsei University Health System (YUHS) in Korea to create medical devices¹ that screen for eye disease by upcycling Galaxy smartphones that are no longer of use.

This Galaxy Upcycling program is helping to address approximately 1 billion global cases of vision impairment that are preventable with proper diagnosis.

Since 2018, Samsung has partnered with IAPB and Yonsei University Health System to benefit the lives and vision of more than 19,000 residents in Vietnam with its portable retinal camera. In 2019 alone, it supplied 90 portable ophthalmoscopes to health professionals operating in remote regions of the country without access to walk-in clinics. Now, Samsung has expanded the program to India, Morocco and Papua New Guinea.

Samsung is also broadening its capabilities to new screening areas, including using upcycled Galaxy devices to create smartphone-based portable colposcopes to screen for cervical cancer and improve women’s accessibility to quality health care.