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NHS Must do Better on Access for Blind People
March 1, 2010 12:41 PM
Local Liberal Democrat MP, Paul Burstow, is calling on senior NHS managers to do more to improve access for blind and partially sighted people. The MP made his call following a briefing organised by the RNIB and Sutton Association of the Blind last Friday (26th February). Ahead of the briefing Mr Burstow contacted the Epsom and St Helier NHS Trust and is also raising the matter with the local Primary Care Trust.
NHS services give health information to blind and partially sighted people in ordinary print, whether they can read it or not. Despite their obligations under the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 and Disability Equality duty 2006, the NHS is still failing to meet the information needs of blind and partially sighted people.
Mr Burstow was briefed on the RNIB's new campaign Losing Patients which aims to empower blind and partially sighted people to secure accessible information from the NHS.
RNIB commissioned a major piece of research in July 2008 to investigate the experiences of blind and partially sighted people across the UK, who had used NHS services in the last twelve months.
Key research findings:
97% of blind and partially sighted people felt it was important for health information to be given in a format they could read themselves.
95% of blind and partially sighted people said they were not asked by NHS staff about what format they require when being given information.
81% said they did not get medicine information in a format that they could read.
Only 1 % of blind and partially sighted people said they wanted written information given via a carer or relative but 28 % of health professionals wrongly though blind and partially sighted people wanted information this way.
Commenting Paul Burstow said, "The fact that much of the NHS fails to provide blind and partially sighted people with personal and general health information they can access independently creates exclusion, frustration, dependency and in some cases danger.
"I have raised this with senior managers in the local NHS. It is high time that the NHS put in place training and procedures to make sure that blind and partially sighted people get information in the format that works best for them."
ENDS
Notes to editors
Case study
Jane Philips, 63, is registered blind and lives in Sutton with her twin sister Mary who is also blind. Jane also has diabetes. Jane has never received information that she can read from the NHS on how to control her diabetes. Jane said: "I'd all but given up asking for information in Braille but as most people know, with diabetes diet and how you control it is vitally important. I was given a diet sheet in standard print that I couldn't read. I asked for it to be provided in Braille or audio and was told, sorry but no, that isn't possible. It made me feel so annoyed."
If Jane would have been presented with the same diet sheet but her first language wasn't English, the NHS could quite correctly provide a choice of some 175 different languages. Jane added: "I have had no choice but to source my own dietary information in Braille which I have had to pay for myself." We {my sister and I} do try to do as much as we can for ourselves but we believe blind people are being treated unfairly when compared to other NHS patients."
Jane wants to know: "Why can't the NHS supply important health information in formats we can read when my bank, telephone and energy suppliers and even local restaurants, have all been supplying us with Information in Braille for years?"
Jane is not alone.
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