Social Services: Sight Impairment

Mark Hunter
To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) what percentage of blind or partially-sighted people have received a visit from social services in each of the last five years;

(2) what percentage of blind or partially-sighted people have been offered formal counselling to help deal with the trauma of sight loss in each of the last five years;

(3) what recent assessment his Department has made of the adequacy of support for blind and partially-sighted people.

Phil Hope
The NHS Information Centre for health and social care does not collect the data requested.

However, councils with social services responsibilities are responsible for the organisation of services in its area. Progress in Sight National Standard of Social Care for Visually Impaired Adults provides a framework against which councils can benchmark their existing services and able them to focus more clearly on what they need to do in order to reach the required standard.