Low vision home therapy service by occupational therapists: The effectiveness of the Seniors' Eye Rehabilitation programme, a pilot study.

INTRODUCTION

This study aims to explore the effectiveness of the Seniors' Eye Rehabilitation (SEER) pilot programme, a visual rehabilitation home therapy by specialised low vision occupational therapists (LVOT).

METHOD

This was an interventional, longitudinal cohort study. Participants were recruited from Singapore National Eye Centre Low Vision Clinic. The occupational therapy interventions include activities of daily living retraining, activities/home modifications, functional/community mobility training and patient/family education. Each participant set two individualised goals (Priority Goal 1 and Priority Goal 2). The Wilcoxon signed-rank test was used to compare baseline and 6-month follow-up scores for Australian Therapy Outcome Measures for Occupational Therapy (AusTOMs-OT) and the Goal Attainment Scale (GAS) ( < 0.05).

RESULTS

Forty-one participants (mean age: 67, 48.8% male) completed SEER. There was statistically significant reduction in activity limitations (1 median point change (MPC),  = -4.21,  < 0.01), participation restrictions (1 MPC,  = -3.951,  < 0.01) and improved well-being (0.5 MPC,  = -3.668,  < 0.01) for Priority Goal 1 using AUSTOM-OT. With GAS, there was a statistically significant improvement in Priority Goal 1 (1 MPC,  = -3.886,  < 0.01).

CONCLUSION

The SEER programme was found to be effective in improving all domains of the AusTOMs-OT and GAS for Priority Goal 1. This provides evidence that visual rehabilitation home therapy by specialised LVOT is beneficial to older adults with visual impairment.