Deafblindness
Overview
Deafblindness is a combination of sight and hearing loss that affects a person's ability to communicate, access information and get around.
Symptoms
Deafblindness most commonly affects older adults, although it can affect people of all ages, including babies and young children. In older people, it may develop gradually and the person themselves may not realise their vision and/or hearing is getting worse at first. Signs of a problem can include: needing to turn up the volume on the television or radiodifficulty following a conversationnot hearing noises such as a knock at the doorasking others to speak loudly, slowly and more clearlyneeding to hold books or newspapers very close, or sitting close to the televisiondifficulty moving around unfamiliar places If someone already has either a hearing or vision problem, it's important to look out for signs that suggest the other sense may be getting worse too. Read more about thesymptoms of deafblindness.
Causes
There are many potential causes of deafblindness. Some babies are born deafblind, but in many cases the hearing and/or vision loss occurs later in life. Causes of deafblindness include: age-related hearing lossgenetic conditions, such asUsher syndrome – read more about Usher syndrome from Sensean infection in a baby in the womb, such asrubella(german measles)cerebral palsy– a problem with the brain and nervous system that mainly affects movement and co-ordinationeye problems associated with increasing age, such ascataracts Read more about thecauses of deafblindness.