Living with blindness and visual impairment

A vision impairment can make daily life more challenging. Upon receiving a diagnosis, you and your family are bound to have questions about the future, how you’ll manage, and what’s possible. The information on this page will help to answer these questions. There’s lots of support available to help you to live independently with a good quality of life, enjoying the things that make you happy.

The eyecare support pathway

Whether you’re having your initial eyecare appointment, or are looking for help during and after diagnosis, there’s support available for you.

For adults, the Adult Eye Care Support Pathway has been designed to help individuals with sight loss navigate their journey. This guide was developed by RNIB in partnership with other sight loss charities, including Guide Dogs.

For those under the age of 18, Guide Dogs has worked with the wider sight loss sector to produce the Eye Care Support Pathway for Children and Young People with Vision Impairment in England. This pathway provides an overview of the typical NHS support journey in England, along with the wider social and educational support services available. It’s designed to support children and their parents or guardians on their journey from pre-diagnosis through to accessing adult services.

Registering as sight impaired or severely sight impaired

People with vision loss can be certified as ‘sight impaired’ or ‘severely sight impaired’ (legally blind). Your ophthalmologist can advise whether you’re eligible and complete a certificate of visual impairment (CVI) for you. This enables you to register as sight impaired and helps you access a range of services, benefits, and other support.

To be certified as sight impaired or severely sight impaired, your ophthalmologist will assess your visual acuity and field of vision. To be certified as severely sight impaired (legally blind), your sight will need to meet one of these descriptions:

• Visual acuity less than 3/60 with a full visual field
• Visual acuity between 3/60 and 6/60 with a severely reduced field of vision, e.g. tunnel vision
• Visual acuity of 6/60 or greater but with a very reduced field of vision, especially if a lot of sight is missing in the lower part of the field

If you have a certificate of visual impairment, you can register with your local authority, which keeps a confidential list of people with sight impairments. Being registered can make you eligible for extra help, assessment, and support. Your local services team can give you more information about the benefits of registering with them.

Financial support for people with vision impairment

By registering as sight impaired with your local authority, you’ll be eligible for extra concessions that help with the day-to-day costs and practicalities of living with a visual impairment. These include:

• Blind person's personal income tax allowance
• Reduced cost TV licence fee
• Blue Badge parking
• Discounted rail and bus travel

You may also be eligible for some welfare benefits, but some are means-tested or depend on your income. Help for people with visual impairments and their families can include:

• Attendance Allowance
• Disability Living Allowance
• Personal Independence Payment
• Contributory Employment and Support Allowance (ESA)
• Job Seeker's Allowance (JSA)
• Pension Credit
• Carer's Allowance

You can find more information about the benefits available through the government website.

Local support groups for people living with vision impairment

One of the best sources of support can be other people living with blindness and visual impairment. They'll often have great practical tips and ideas you might not find elsewhere, as well as understanding the emotional side of living with sight loss.

The Guide Dogs help line, Guide Line, can put you in touch with local support groups. You can also search the Visionary website to find support from local organisations.

Managing at home with blindness and visual impairment

Your eye care team should refer you for help to manage at home – many adaptations and adjustments can make life easier and safer. These include equipment, skills and tactics, and technology around the house.

Your ophthalmologist can refer you to a specialist low-vision clinic for a low vision assessment (LVA). A low vision assessment explores what useful vision you have and the aids that will be the most helpful for you.

Social services can assess the support you need for living independently at home. This could include help with cooking, cleaning, staying safe at home, and getting around outside.

You may get help from a Vision Rehabilitation Specialist. They can help you learn or re-learn the skills you need to cope with the practicalities of daily life with sight loss.

There are many kinds of assistive technology and kit to help with daily living. From relatively simple tools like a liquid level indicator to stop you from overfilling your mug to more advanced technologies such as computer screen reading software, voice recognition technology, e-readers, and accessibility features and apps on smartphones, there’s plenty of tech out there.

Braille uses a combination of raised dots to depict the alphabet and numbers, allowing you to read with your fingers. Find out more about learning braille for adults and children.

There are online resources that can help you with independent living skills at home and personal care.

Working with a vision impairment

You can work with a vision impairment with the help of some adjustments and support. Employers have a legal duty to make reasonable adjustments that meet your needs.

There may be practical things that will help, including:

• Screen reader software, voice recognition programmes, apps and accessibility features on digital devices
• Brighter lighting
• Visuals aids such as magnifiers

The Access to Work scheme also gives grants for equipment or services above and beyond the adjustments your employer should make. These can be used in many ways, for example: for help getting to and from work if you can't use public transport, to pay for a support worker at work, for specialist equipment, and more.

Having a vision impairment can make it harder to find work. It's important to know your rights and feel confident talking to prospective employers, not just about your skills and capabilities but also your support needs, such as the use of adaptive technology.

Getting around with a vision impairment

It’s natural to think about how you’ll navigate your home and outdoors with a visual impairment, especially if you’re diagnosed as an adult.

Moving about can be more challenging at home, and you may need to learn some new skills and tactics. It can take a while to learn these, but your confidence will grow in time. Some of the techniques that could help you include:

• Protective techniques - protect your body, face and head when looking for things, especially in a familiar indoor environment
• Trailing - helps you move safely between rooms, learning about your surroundings
• Learning the layout of a room - helping you enter spaces that aren't familiar
• Using a cane - many people with a vision impairment use a cane to get around safely

Sometimes you can have an eye condition but still meet the DVLA's minimum standard for driving by wearing prescription glasses, for example. However, this is unlikely if you are sight impaired or severely sight impaired. If you've been used to driving, this can be hard to come to terms with.

It's helpful to know the transport options near you – buses, trains, or taxis. If you are registered as sight impaired, you can get help with concessions such as the Disabled Person's Railcard and discounts for bus travel. Plus, there are plenty of apps to help you navigate public transport.

Support in schools for children with vision impairment

If your child has a vision impairment, it’s likely that you’ll need to speak to their school about the support they’ll need. The school will need to think about adjustments for your child’s everyday learning, but also for exams, school clubs, school trips, and the school’s physical environment. Some examples of support in school could include: 

• Ensuring the appropriate lighting is used in classrooms
• Inviting the student to choose the seat that’s best for them
• Providing exam papers in accessible formats, such as braille or with larger font
• Ensuring after school clubs are accessible to all

Please visit our page on reasonable adjustments in schools to access our guides. These guides are tailored to whether your child will attend school in England, Scotland, or Wales.

Support from Guide Dogs

At Guide Dogs, we have a wide range of services, both with and without guide dogs, and a team of experts who can work with you to understand your needs and agree on a plan that’s right for you.

The ways we could help you:

• Habilitation or rehabilitation of important life skills
• Our guide dog service
• Our Vision Rehabilitation Specialists can make recommendations best suited to you and your needs
• Tips and advice to help you make the most of your remaining vision
• Resources and support on how technology can improve your independence