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What shapes quality of life of visually impaired children and young people?

Guest post by Ana Semrov, PhD student and study researcher, Vision and Eyes research team at UCL

Childhood visual impairment can have a significant impact on a person across their whole life, affecting their social and educational outcomes, career prospects and quality of life. However, how individual children and their families adapt to living with a visual disability is very variable. 

We aim to find out what helps children and young people with visual impairment and their families adjust to living with impaired eyesight and helps them have a good quality of life. We hope this will help us to develop and improve care and support for families of children and young people with visual impairment. 

To do this, we are inviting children and young people with visual impairment and their families to take part in our study. Taking part in this study would involve both the child/young person with visual impairment and at least one of their parents/carers completing some questionnaires about topics like general health, well-being, and relationships with others.

If you would like to participate, please fill in a few questions that will tells us a bit about you to help us make sure this study is right for you. To answer these questions, please go to https://redcap.idhs.ucl.ac.uk/surveys/?s=9FNN88TLENTKY4YE.

This research is funded by Fight for Sight and Ulverscroft Foundation, awarded to Professor Jugnoo Rahi.

Ifigeneia stands in front of a whiteboard in a lecture theatre.

Calling parents of 12-14 year olds – research questionnaire

Ifigeneia Manitsa is a Psychology researcher at Kingston University London and her research is about the social and academic inclusion of adolescents with and without visual impairments.

She is currently conducting a study looking at the relationship between school engagement and social behaviour in adolescents with and without visual impairments. She is also interested in investigating teachers’ perceptions of the inclusion of adolescents with visual impairments.

She would like to interview adolescents with visual impairments, aged 12-14 years, who attend mainstream or mainstream schools with special resourced provision, their parents, and teachers. The adolescents who participate in this study may have visual impairment, but they do not have any other learning or cognitive disabilities. In addition, QTVIs (Qualified Teacher of the Visually Impaired) and teaching assistants/support staff have been excluded from this study.

Adolescents’ questionnaires will take approximately 10-15 minutes to complete and they can be completed via Skype/Zoom. Their parents and teachers’ questionnaires will take approximately 10-15 minutes and they can be completed online.

Would you be interested in participating in this study or do you know someone who could be interested in participating? If yes, please do not hesitate to contact Ifigeneia.

Email Ifigeneia to take part: [email protected]  

Technology use in young people with impaired vision: a new study

Guest post from Saima Begum, University College London

I am a student at University College London, studying at the Institute of Education and I am emailing to ask for your help with my Masters research project into Vision Impairment.

This project aims to examine technology use in young people with vision impairment, and whether this influences their educational attainment.

There is much research that has found that technology such as screen-readers on phones have been useful for people with vision impairment to be able to function in everyday life, so my project is aiming to look at whether technology use can also have positive effects on education.

Moreover, because of the increasing use of social media, I plan to look at whether technology use can have a positive effect on friendships. This data is important to collect as it will show how young people with VI use technology, and how this could be utilised so they perform better in school.

Participants are invited, between the ages of 11 and 18.

All questionnaires can be completed online, and participants can do this from the comfort of their own homes.

Click or tap here for the questionnaire 

The questionnaire is accessible for screen readers. The first page of the questionnaire also includes an information sheet with more details regarding the project.

People chatting.

Nystagmus researchers need your help

Common misconceptions about nystagmus

A team of nystagmus researchers in the UK have recently shown that there is significant variation in the way people with nystagmus are supported and given information, from diagnosis to treatments and beyond.

They are now interested in studying public perceptions of nystagmus and are developing a similar questionnaire for both people with nystagmus (and their parents/carers) but also the general public.

The study will take the form of an online questionnaire and seek to understand both the public’s assumptions and understanding of what nystagmus is, alongside what people with nystagmus feel is commonly misunderstood or misinterpreted.

Do you have any suggestions for things which the research teams could ask to help highlight common misconceptions or assumptions about nystagmus? If so, please complete the form below. Thank you.

Thank you to everyone for sharing your thoughts on common misconceptions about nystagmus. This study is now closed. We will report on progress as soon as we can.

Nystagmus acquired after a stroke?

Professor Fiona Rowe from the Institute of Psychology, Health and Society at the University of Liverpool is currently seeking patients to take part in an online anonymous questionnaire about eye movement disorders.

An expert in post stroke vision, Professor Rowe would like to recruit adult patients with acquired nystagmus to help determine future patient treatment and care.

If you would like to find out more about the questionnaire, please click here.