Orientation and Mobility Services for Persons with Visual Impairments: South African Orientation and Mobility Practitioners’ Eye View

Abstract

Orientation and mobility (O&M) practice is important because the population of persons with visual impairments is large enough to warrant planned action on measures to help them acquire independence and sustain their livelihoods. Most O&M practitioners in South Africa are full-time employees in nongovernmental organizations. The few who work in public service work in schools. The research presented here sought to explore and describe the current state of O&M practice in South Africa as perceived by O&M practitioners, so as to determine factors that could contribute to its improvement. Although the study was conducted in South Africa, its findings could inform O&M practitioners in other parts of the world, particularly in developing countries. The research was deemed necessary because O&M is central to the independence of persons who are visually impaired (those who are blind and those with low vision), since it enhances their physical access to desired places and resources for living without them overly depending on other people. The problem of a high client-to-practitioner ratio is exemplified in South Africa, where an estimated 1% of the population of 50,586,757, or 505,867, are visually impaired (Statistics South Africa, 2011). Since 1974, about 100 O&M practitioners have been trained in South Africa (College of Orientation and Mobility, 2010). That is, 12 groups of 80&M practitioners have been trained in the past 36 years, each group taking 3 years. The size of each class is small but not unthinkable, considering that in Uganda, Kyambogo University trained 36 certificate-level O&M practitioners in 3 years, at an average of 12 students per year. For a 3-year diploma, the same university initially trained an average of 14 students in the first two groups (1999-2001 and 2002-2004) and reduced the number to 9 per class in the next two groups (2003-2005 and 2004-2006) (Bayo, n.d., Table 1). Thus, it would take 3 years to produce one group of 9 diploma-level O&M practitioners. In both countries, class sizes are small. However, since Uganda managed to train 82 practitioners in 7 years, its rate of training is faster than that of South These shortages are not unique in the provision of services to persons with visual impairments, especially in Africa, where, according to Sommer (2004), there is one ophthalmologist for every 1 million people. Shortages were also lamented by the South African National Council for the Blind (2009, p. 13) when it alluded to a rehabilitation service delivery crisis in South Africa. The Natal Society for the Blind (1993) also lamented the lack of O&M skills among children who are visually impaired during their school years. At least in developing countries, organizations identify an unmet need for O&M services. Cognizant that staff shortages are common in many countries, it was important to gather the perceptions of O&M practitioners with regard to their practice with a view to informing readers. Practitioners' opinions on the strengths and needs of their profession could offer useful insights to other practitioners in similar circumstances the world over. The College of Orientation and Mobility (2010) estimated that the ideal number of clients a practitioner could train per annum was 24. Perhaps the college's estimate is based on the general observation that O&M practitioners who visit clients and train them in their homes reach out to an average of 6 clients every three months. The estimate is much higher than the Ugandan trend, in which 82 O&M practitioners trained 400 clients between 1996 and 2006 (Bayo, n.d., Table 1). In the study presented here, the estimate (24 clients) is loosely referred to merely as a comparative baseline. Literature from different organizations and the experiences of various practitioners largely differ with the college's estimate, although figures issued by Pioneer Institute for the Blind (2007, p. …