Changes of the Population of Deafblindness in Russia

Abstract

Analysis of the data gathered during the last 35 years of observations as well as diagnostic studies and studies of catamnesis of deafblind, blind children with additional impairments and adults in Russia confirms the fact of significant changes in this population which is getting more severely impaired in the recent years. There are fewer cases of early acquired Deafblindness where only periphery impairments of visual and hearing analyser systems take place. We can witness more often the cases of the malformation of brain structure or early impairment of the central nervous system on the cortical level which bring to system disorders impacting the future development not only in the sensory but also in the emotional and intellectual fields of child’s development. A special analysis of all developmental case-histories of children having innate and early acquired blindness complicated by additional disorders shows that among this population in different years of observations there is a rather stable number of children who can have a rather good prognosis of their psychological development (around 20% of cases). Long-time observations though showed that a part of these children who were seeming to be in a good state from the point of view of their safe abilities got worse while entering into the adolescent and elder age; so at the end they became part of a group of the low functioning or mental retarded children with additional sensory disabilities.