Visually handicapped children and their families.

Some Main Findings: Under 25% of the eligible sample group were registered as blind or partially sighted. This under representation of the problem makes planning for the future difficult. There were communication difficulties between many professionals and clients with associated differences in the perceptions of need. Professionals tend to work within their own "ivory towers" and do not communicate with professionals of other disciplines. This leads to patchy and uneven services. Low ratings of satisfaction were awarded to some groups of professionals, and these low ratings were often associated with communication difficulties. High ratings of satisfaction on the other hand tended to be awarded where the client had: an on-going relationship, with the same named person, who is an expert in the field, all three of these inter-linked factors being necessary for client satisfaction. The dynamics of family life are disturbed and disrupted by the diagnosis of blindness and the rearing of a severely visually impaired child in the majority of instances. Passage through crisis, however, does not inevitably lead to family breakdown and it is worthy of note that a number of the families studied, although severely tested, appeared to emerge from the crisis, not merely intact but actually strengthened.