Use of vision rehabilitation and adaptive devices among adults with visual impairment, U.S. 2002

Visual impairment is an important public health issue with significant personal, societal, and economic implications. Visual rehabilitation services and adaptive devices can help visually impaired people to gain or maintain independence and to improve their quality of life. Healthy People 2010 vision objective 28-10 is to increase the use of visual rehabilitation services and adaptive devices. National survey data on these topics were collected in a special supplement to the 2002 National Health Interview Survey. Data were obtained from 31,044 adults 18 years and older and analyzed using SUDAAN software. In 2002 3,089 adults reported having trouble seeing even when wearing glasses or contact lenses. Visually impaired persons were more likely to be older, female and diagnosed with diabetes, have less than a high school education, and household income below 200% of federal poverty level. Only 1.4% of visually impaired adults reported that they used vision rehabilitation services. Given the low rate of usage, it was not possible to estimate reliable rates within or across socio-demographic subgroups. Visual adaptive devices were used by 26% of visually impaired adults. White non-Hispanic persons and persons with diabetes were more likely to use adaptive devices than their counterparts. This study presents national data on the use of visual rehabilitation services and adaptive devices used to set the baseline and targets for the Healthy People 2010 objective. With the aging of the American population, addressing visual impairment will become a greater public health issue with increasing personal and societal implications.