Vision rehabilitation in the case of blindness.
This article examines the various vision rehabilitation procedures that are available for early and late blindness. Depending on the pathology involved, several vision rehabilitation procedures exist, or are in development. Visual aids are available for low vision individuals, as are sensory aids for blind persons. Most noninvasive sensory substitution prostheses as well as implanted visual prostheses in development are reviewed. Issues dealing with vision rehabilitation are also discussed, such as problems of biocompatibility, electrical safety, psychosocial aspects, and ethics. Basic studies devoted to vision rehabilitation such as simulation in mathematical models and simulation of artificial vision are also presented. Finally, the importance of accurate rehabilitation assessment is addressed, and tentative market figures are given.
Veraart
Claude
C
Neural Rehabilitation Engineering Laboratory, Universite catholique de Louvain, 54 Avenue Hippocrate Box UCL-54.46, B-1200 Brussels, Belgium. veraart@gren.ucl.ac.be
Duret
Florence
F
Brelén
Marten
M
Oozeer
Medhy
M
Delbeke
Jean
J
D001766:Blindness / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D004599:Electric Stimulation Therapy / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods* / Q000639:trends; D004867:Equipment Design; D006801:Humans; D019736:Prostheses and Implants; D012682:Sensory Aids; D013673:Technology Assessment, Biomedical