Chandraprabha Eye Hospital was initially started as Cataract & IOL Hospital which was started by Dr. Narayan Bardoloi, an ophthalmologist of Jorhat in 1994. Dr. Bardoloi at that time was working at Jorhat Civil Hospital as Medical and Health Officer. In 1994, he took leave and went for a fellowship training at Iladevi Cataract & IOL Hospital, Ahmedabad. He was trained by Dr. A.R.Vasavada who is one of the finest cataract surgeon India has ever produced. Under Dr. Vasavada’s guidance Dr. Bardoloi learnt the basics of ECCE & IOL surgery and also a bit of Phaco Surgery. On return from his training under Dr. Vasavada, Dr. Bardoloi started a small hospital in the name of Cataract & IOL Hospital at Jorhat. Prior to the set up of this hospital, IOL surgery in Jorhat was non existent. Dr. Bardoloi bought a Topcon operating microscope with the help of bank loan and started doing ECCE and IOL surgery at Cataract & IOL Hospital. This evoked a very good response not only at Jorhat but also in the adjoining districts of Sivasagar, Golaghat, Dibrugarh, Tinsukia, Karbianglang, Nagaon & Sonitpur as well. In 1996, Dr. Bardoloi procured an Alcon phaco machine and started doing phaco surgery.  He is the first ophthalmologist in Assam to start this procedure and read a paper entitled “Chopping in the Learning Stage of Phacoemulsification” at Asia Pacific IOL and Refractive conference held at New Delhi in 1997.

His introduction of phaco procedures brought about an increase in the number of cataract surgical cases at Cataract & IOL Hospital. Dr. Bardoloi planned to expand the hospital to include more subspecialties as people started asking for these facilities. Realizing the need he has constructed an eye hospital at Jorhat named Chandraprabha Eye Hospital with all the clinical facilities which are generally present in a tertiary level eye care institution. 

There was no facility for vitreo-retinal investigation and treatment in entire Upper Assam. For this, people have to travel to Sri Sankardeva Nethralaya, Guwahati, Sankara Nethralaya, Chennai, L V Prasad Eye Institute, Hyderabad or RP Center of Ophthalmic Sciences, AIIMS, New Delhi to get their VR ailments investigated and treated. CPEH equipped itself with all state of the art vitreo-retinal equipments including Laser, Digital Angiography System, Ultrasound, Vitrectomy Machine etc. It also recruited a young VR surgeon trained at Sankara Nethralaya, Chennai. Almost all the VR procedures including complex surgeries are now performed at CPEH. This has brought a substantial relief to the patients of entire Upper and North Assam.