A brief report of the prevalence of chronic and acute health conditions among blind American adults.
Nazanin M Heydarian, Yessenia Castro, Osvaldo F Morera
PMID 33640309WHAT IT FOUND
Blind and low-vision U.S. adults self-reported many lifetime health conditions.
Men more often reported stroke, migraine, arthritis, and recent hospitalization than women.
Key findings
01Among 409 blind and low-vision adults, men reported higher prevalence than women for stroke (10% vs 7.5%), migraine headaches (10.0% vs 7.5%), rheumatoid arthritis (24.6% vs 8.8%), osteoarthritis (30.9% vs 12.9%), and having had one recent hospitalization (21.3% vs 7.2%).
02Nearly all participants reported taking medications regularly, while self-reported regular physical activity was very low.
03The study reported prevalence for conditions that had no prior published prevalence among blind and low-vision adults, including encephalitis or meningitis, multiple sclerosis, and Alzheimer's disease.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for OTs
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What it does not show
Participants were not randomly sampled, and people with health conditions may have been more likely to join, so estimates may overstate prevalence. The sample was mostly White, and minority participants were underrepresented, so race and ethnicity differences could not be examined. The study did not collect sexual and gender identity, geography, employment, or income, so those factors could not be accounted for. Participants' reports were not separated by cause of vision loss, and heart attack and bypass surgery were reported together. Missing data were common and were handled with statistical imputation, so estimates depend partly on imputed values. The sample was younger than some earlier blind-adult samples, so results may not match older blind adults.
Declared interests
The authors declared no conflicts of interest. The article is listed as supported by NIH and U.S. government, non-P.H.S. research support.
The easy way to misread this
Do not treat these percentages as exact rates for all blind U.S. adults. The sample was not randomly selected, and people with health conditions may have been more likely to participate, which could overestimate conditions.