Blindness

Synonyms

Medical: Amaurosis

Definition

Blindness is a severe loss of vision caused by illness, injury or childbirth, which leads to a serious break in the life you are used to.

Causes

Blindness can be a slow process in which vision becomes progressively worse, or blindness can occur suddenly. There are different causes for these two cases. Sudden blindness is caused by massive trauma that can result from accidents.

In addition, the artery that is responsible for the blood supply to the eye can become blocked. Deposits in the artery or a thrombus can block the artery, so that the retina is no longer supplied with sufficient oxygen. An acute increase in intraocular pressure, an inflammation of the eye‘s skin, which is also called uvea, a vitreous hemorrhage and a retinal detachment are further causes of sudden blindness.

In contrast, slowly progressing blindness is caused by age-related changes in the macula (macular degeneration), the point of sharpest vision on the retina. Consequential diseases of a diabetes, infections or even cataracts are other possible diseases that can cause blindness. Depending on the cause, both a drug therapy and a surgical therapy can be performed.

Social aspects of blindness

The loss of sight is accompanied by a massive cut in the life of the person affected. Thus, the loss of sight must be compensated by other sensory organs as well as possible. Everyday routine tasks (e.g. walking on public streets and in unfamiliar surroundings) become a challenge when a person becomes blind.

Those affected by blindness are also dependent on help from others in unfamiliar ways. The most important thing is that patients with blindness find their way back into their previous lives as well as possible. In special professional institutions it has become possible for blind people to earn a living again if the original profession is no longer possible due to the illness.

There are numerous aids that can be made available to blind patients to help them find their way in normal life and everyday life again. This includes prescribing and training with a blind person’s walking stick. This is usually a white stick with a corresponding extension at the end of which a ball or roller is attached.

With the help of this cane, the patient can scan the floor in front of him or her, find unevenness and obstacles and avoid them. Blind patients often pull the cane along edges (e.g. curbs or platform edges) in order to be able to estimate the exact border. Training with a blind person’s cane should last 80 hours and should be prescribed by a doctor.

Some people affected by blindness also opt for a specially trained dog, which they lead in front of them in a special harness and which also warns them of obstacles and leads the patients e.g. over roads. Today, the identification of blind people in relation to their surroundings has become rather rare. Thus the internationally recognized sign of blindness is three black dots on a yellow background, which stand in the form of a triangle to each other.

These signs are still worn today in the form of buttons; the armbands, which used to be the most common, are rarely seen today. Especially many problems are caused by the way sighted people deal with those who suffer from blindness, as many cannot cope with the situation. Sighted people often want to rush to the aid of the blind and help them across the street, for example, but this is usually not in the interest of the blind who have already adapted to their new life.

Blind associations give the tip that one should help quietly, but first wait for the request of the blind person. In the vocational training of blind people, a distinction must be made between whether blindness has existed since childhood or only occurred later. Vocational training centers or vocational promotion centers take care of the education of disabled people and develop special programs.

In addition to vocational training, there are now a large number of schools for people with blindness, which use special writings and books to familiarize the students with the contents of learning. Braille refers to characters that are raised from the flat paper surface of books, for example, by embossing and can thus be felt by those reading them.There are now numerous guidelines on how blindness can be prevented. For example, numerous occupational safety regulations have been issued to prevent damage to the eye.

In addition to regular check-ups at the ophthalmologist, a full correction of ametropia is recommended, if necessary with glasses. In addition, special emphasis is placed on adequate lighting at the workplace and in living rooms. TV should not be seen in completely darkened rooms and a light source should be placed behind the TV set.