MAJOR COUNTY-WIDE SURVEY LAUNCHED TO FIND OUT ISSUES FACING COUNTY’S VISUALLY-IMPAIRED

A major Norfolk-wide survey has been launched by the county’s sight loss charity to ensure its services continue to meet the needs of the county’s visually-impaired after the Covid pandemic.

Vision Norfolk is seeking the views of Norfolk’s 30,000 plus visually-impaired people about what support they would like to see the charity provide in the future – and the organisation is particularly interested in hearing from those who have not accessed Vision Norfolk’s services in the past.

The online survey – which is also available in Large Print format and in Braille – will help the charity focus its activities on areas of the greatest need.  People can also be surveyed on the telephone if they prefer.

“There are over 30,000 people with sight loss and visual impairment in Norfolk, and our role is to support them no matter where they are on their journey – from initial diagnosis of a sight issue, right through to living with total sight loss,” said Gina Dormer, chief executive of Vision Norfolk.

“Over the 216 years we have been in existence, our services have constantly evolved to meet the changing needs of the county’s visually-impaired people.  As we emerge from the Covid pandemic, we want to make sure that what we are offering genuinely reflects what visually-impaired people need – and the only people who can tell us that are those living with sight loss themselves.

“Increasingly people living with sight loss are wanting to live more independent lives than might have been the case in the past, and we must adapt what we offer to enable them to achieve that.

“We engage with several thousand visually-impaired people each year, but equally there are many more who currently don’t use our services.  We would particularly like to hear from them, so that we can adapt what we do to reach out to more people.”

The wide-ranging survey explores a huge range of issues from technology to barriers to employment, social isolation to finance, transport to access to support services.

The survey runs throughout February, and can be accessed online at www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/visionnorfolk; alternatively, those wishing to take part can phone Vision Norfolk on 01603 573000 to receive a Large Print or Braille version of the survey, or to request a telephone appointment with a member of the charity’s staff to complete the questionnaire.