Congenital deafblindness Supporting children and adults who have visual and hearing disabilities since birth or shortly afterwards Bartiméus aims to record and share knowledge and experience gained about possibilities for people with visual disabilities. The Bartiméus series is an example of this. Colophon Bartiméus PO Box 340 3940 AH Doorn (NL) Tel. +31 88 88 99 888 Email:
[email protected] www.bartimeus.nl Authors: Saskia Damen Mijkje Worm Photos: Ingrid Korenstra ‘This digital edition is based on the first edition with ISBN 978-90-821086-1-3’ Copyright 2013 Bartiméus All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a data retrieval system or made public, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, by photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Although every attempt has been made to reference the literature in line with copyright law, this proved no longer possible in a number of cases. In such cases, Bartiméus asks that you contact them, so that this can be rectified in a second edition. 2 Preface Since 1980, Bartiméus has offered specialised support to people with visual and hearing disabilities, especially those born with visual and hearing disabilities, referred to as congenital deafblindness. Bartiméus staff have had the opportunity to get to know these people intensively over the past 30 years. Many people with deafblindness have lived in the same place for many years and have a permanent and trusted team of caregivers who have been with them during all facets of their daily lives, at both good and bad times.