These services include:
• Volunteer co-ordinators to help increase the scope and variety of services available to visually impaired people.
• Rehabilitation officers to help blind people adapt to the problems sight loss can cause.
• Family support officers and one to one support for visually impaired children, their families and carers.
• Help with IT equipment.
• Lunch clubs and social opportunities for isolated and vulnerable elderly people with sight problems.
The following shopping list gives an idea of what services like this cost.
• £11 covers the costs of a lunch club and activities for a lonely elderly person to attend.
• It costs around £220 per family to attend a series of group and one to one sessions to help a blind child come to terms with losing their sight.
• A computer with specialist software for a partially sighted child costs around £1,500 and installation and training for the equipment costs around an extra £150.
We hope to visit some of these services in the coming months and meet some of the people who have been helped, thanks to the generosity of the GLFB's supporters.
