The school was established in 1989 by the Ministry of Health of Ghana with special assistance from Sight Savers International. This was as a result of an International workshop on Human Resource for Prevention of Blindness held in Accra in 1988 for Anglophone Africa by the World Health Organization (WHO). During that period the then Hon. Secretary for Health (Nana Akuoku Sarpong) challenged the Ghanaian delegates at the workshop to come out with a plan for the prevention of blindness in Ghana.

A National Committee for the Prevention of Blindness was inaugurated with Dr. J. D. Otoo, the then Director of Human Resource Development Division of the Ministry of Health, as its first Chairman and Dr. Maria Hagan was named as the Technical Coordinator for the Prevention of Blindness. The Committee set to work immediately and developed the first 5-year National Plan of Action for Eye Care and Prevention of Blindness with the support of Sight Savers International (formerly Royal Commonwealth Society for the Blind) for Ghana. The school was born out of this.