We are developing a consumer and carer handbook for older people living with dual sensory impairment. Please fill out our survey to help up gain insights that will inform the design of a consumer and carers handbook for people with combined vision and hearing loss. We are seeking input directly from people with combined hearing and vision loss (or dual …
Author: Anmmaree Watharow
A Report from The United Kingdom
Usher syndrome is the most common cause of deafblindness in people under 65 years of age, accounting for around fifty percent. In most cases, Usher syndrome is the combination of congenital deafness and acquired low vision that degenerates over time. It may be associated with balance disorders and cataracts. The hearing loss is usually stable, but subtypes have been identified …
A Report from Spain
I am in Spain in a town by the Balearic Sea. Not for recreation but for intense work on a new core set for deafblindness in the International Classification of Function (ICF). There’s a beach outside, a waterslide too, and even a roller coaster. But we are inside focused on deciding and debating what features of deafblindness or dual sensory …
Book Review – True Biz
Sara Novic, Penguin Random House, 2022 pp ISBN 9780593241509 Through a blend of fiction and creative non-fiction Sara Novic has crafted an urgent and compelling lament of the demise of culturally important Deaf education In America. The fiction takes readers into the pleasures and pains of Deaf communities and outliers, whilst the non-fiction unwraps some mysteries of American sign language …
Book Review – Disrupting the academy with lived experience-led knowledge
Maree Higgins and Caroline Lenette (eds) Policy Press, Bristol, 2024 pp 194ISBN: 9781447366348 (pbk) Expert-knowers write chapters in this work, challenging academic norms, while providing potent examples of lived experience-led research. The epistemic justice framing in which lived experiences are prioritised and honoured, entwines with social justice. As Estelle Keerthana Ramaswamy notes: ‘Authors should declare their positionality in their research and writing …
Seeing things that aren’t there
Last week Annmaree and Suzie travelled to Newcastle to talk on “seeing things that aren’t there” or visual hallucinations, often called Charles Bonnet syndrome. “Seeing things that aren’t there”, that no one else can see and that are called visual hallucinations. “Seeing things that aren’t there” is very common in people with problems seeing well. Deafblind people “see things that …
Being Included in Museum Visits
Travelling can be a complicated experience when you have combined hearing loss and low vision. In particular, going to galleries, museums and exhibitions can often be an excluding experience: not enough accessible information, few visual descriptions, scarce large print materials and frequently, noisy, crowded surrounds. Sometimes I trail behind my husband feeling bored. Sometimes I drink tea in the café …
Occupational Therapy Students Lecture
We sometimes fail to realise that teaching is a gift given and one that is received too. As part of the Master of Occupational Therapy Course, Annmaree, Suzanne and Susannah went to give a lecture on dual sensory impairment using lived experience, research and verbatim testimony. We covered key issues: Annmaree’s journey with deafness and then blindness and the funny …