Abstract
Visual impairment present from birth or from an early childhood may lead to psychosocial and emotional disorders. 11-40% of children in the group with visual impairment show traits of autism. The aim of this paper was to present the selected examples of how visual impairment in children is related to the occurrence of autism and to describe the available tools for diagnosing autism in children with visual impairment. So far the relation between visual impairment in children and autism has not been sufficiently confirmed. Psychiatric and psychological diagnosis of children with visual impairment has some difficulties in differentiating between "blindism" and traits typical for autism resulting from a lack of standardized diagnostic tools used to diagnosing children with visual impairment. Another difficulty in diagnosing autism in children with visual impairment is the coexistence of other disabilities in case of most children with vision impairment. Additionally, apart from difficulties in diagnosing autistic disorders in children with eye dysfunctions there is also a question of what tools should be used in therapy and rehabilitation of patients.
Highlights
The majority of children are diagnosed with visual impairment at birth or in early childhood [1]
Some research showed that autistic traits may coexist in case of children with visual impairment; such symptoms may be observed with 11–40% of children with acute vision disorders [6,7,8]
The purpose of this paper is to present the results of research on the coexistence of autism and visual impairment in children and to describe the available tools for diagnosing autism in children with visual impairment
Summary
Magdalena Wrzes ińs ka, Joanna Kap ias 2, Katarzyna Nowakowska - Domagała 3, Józef Kocur 4. The aim of this paper was to present the selected examples of how visual impairment in children is related to the occurrence of autism and to describe the available tools for diagnosing autism in children with visual impairment. Psychiatric and psychological diagnosis of children with visual impairment has some difficulties in differentiating between “blindism” and traits typical for autism resulting from a lack of standardized diagnostic tools used to diagnosing children with visual impairment. Another difficulty in diagnosing autism in children with visual impairment is the coexistence of other disabilities in case of most children with vision impairment.
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