Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to determine whether specific services such as emotional and family support are currently available in the United Kingdom for people with visual impairment.
Methods
A validated online survey was created and distributed to clinical staff in eye clinics (for example, ophthalmologists and optometrists) and rehabilitation staff (for example, social and rehabilitation workers) in the community, who worked with people with visual impairment. A total of 67 clinical and 42 rehabilitation staff completed the entire survey online.
Results
Only 67% of the respondents claimed their clinics provide emotional support and 44% of respondent’s clinics provided family support. Clinical and rehabilitation staff have differences in opinion over what constitutes an essential service for a visually impaired patient. Rehabilitation staff considered emotional support and referral to social services as essential more often than clinical staff (P<0.05). There is some confusion over the type of personnel who provides each type of service, with some services showing substantial repetition.
Conclusion
In the clinics sampled, there appears to be an underprovision of emotional support (attentive listening plus constructive suggestions) and family support (emotional support and advice for family members) for visually impaired patients in the United Kingdom. There also seems to be some discrepancy in services that eye care professionals feel are available and previous reports by visually impaired patients of the service they receive. There is a need to develop standardised pathways across the United Kingdom, to solve some of these issues.
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Acknowledgements
We would like to thank Sally Kaye and Joanna Hook for assisting with the development of the survey, and the participants who took part in the pilot study. We would also like to thank everyone who completed the survey from the following professional bodies and groups: The College of Optometrists, Association of British Dispensing Opticians, British and Irish Orthoptic Society, Royal College of Ophthalmologists, London Rehabilitation Workers Forum, Southern Rehab Forum, Yorkshire Regional Rehabilitation Workers Group, Midlands Rehabilitation Workers Group, North West Special Interest Group, Wales Rehab Forum, Fife Society for the Blind, Rehabilitation workers in Northern Ireland. This project was funded by the RNIB.
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Previous presentations of this work: Gillespie-Gallery H, Subramanian A, Conway M. Evaluating the impact of Eye Care Liaison Officers. Presented at the Vision UK Annual Meeting, Birmingham, UK, 2010; Gillespie-Gallery H, Conway M, Subramanian A. Services for visually impaired people in the UK: Is there room for improvement? Presented at the Annual Meeting of the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology, Fort Lauderdale, FL, USA, 2010; Gillespie-Gallery H, Conway M, Subramanian A. The opinions of eye care professionals on patient related, low vision services in the UK. Presented at the College of Optometrists Research Symposium, York, UK, 2010.
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Gillespie-Gallery, H., Conway, M. & Subramanian, A. Are rehabilitation services for patients in UK eye clinics adequate? A survey of eye care professionals. Eye 26, 1302–1309 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/eye.2012.141
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/eye.2012.141
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