Please Help Us
We urgently need money to fund:
• Salaries for our specialist medical social workers
• Respite care
• Independence training
• Grants for special equipment or other needs not covered by statutory provision
Our medical social workers
This is our greatest fund raising need. The Trust operates through our medical social workers who visit the children and their families, discuss their problems and needs, and give support and advice. Their caseload is increasing by about 30% each year as more children are born with anophthalmia, microphthalmia or coloboma and as more families with such children contact the Trust for help. Anophthalmia and microphthalmia is not just a question of blindness or impaired vision. Children with these conditions may suffer from behavioural and developmental problems and up to one third suffer from other physical or mental disabilities. They and their families may therefore need a great deal of regular support and help.
It costs an average of £300 a month for a medical social worker to support just one family in crisis.
Respite Care
Caring for an anophthalmic or microphthalmic child, particularly one with behavioural problems or other disabilities, can be exhausting for the family. Many of the families are under extreme pressure, relationships are strained, other children feel ignored and the whole family may be suffering from sleep deprivation – an anophthalmic child does not know the difference between night and day. We receive more enquiries about respite care than any other topic. Very special carers are needed to take on this responsibility and unfortunately they are not always easy to find. Further, for a variety of reasons, families in many areas are unable to get statutory support for regular respite care.
Three hours of respite care costs £35, so over 48 weeks, the total cost for just 3 hours a week for 30 families is £65,000. We know of many more families who desperately want such support – just a few hours a week for shopping, outings, children’s school activities etc. We urgently need money to pay for respite care, to deliver real, regular support where it is most needed.
In certain cases residential respite care, which can cost more than £100 a day, is also arranged following consultation with the parents.
Family Holidays
In 2002, as an experiment we took 3 families to a hotel in Blackpool where they enjoyed a week’s stay.
The stay was truly therapeutic for all, and we have decided to arrange the week again and also to book the whole hotel for a further week solely for Eyeless Trust families. The total cost of the project will be over £12,000. A further £10,000 is sought for grants to at least 20 families arranging their own holidays.
Independence Training
Why is this needed and what is it? It is natural for children to leave home one day, but parents (especially Eyeless Trust parents, as you can imagine) often find it difficult to envisage how their child will cope in the world. This is where we can help.
Eyeless is starting to send youngsters to Specialist Centres for a period of training, under supervision, to learn how to do the everyday things in life: shopping, using a microwave, a washing machine and an iron, and many other things that perhaps the rest of us take for granted. This training is expensive and costs will gradually become higher as our children become older.
Grants for Special Expenses
In the majority of cases, the affected families have limited financial means. The medical social workers will investigate the availability of statutory grants, but, where none are available, the Trust will try and help.
A vital trip to hospital frequently costs £300 or more.
Educational aids, such as specially adapted computers, can cost £3,000 or more.
Video
Our new video gives a vivid picture of our work and the help that we can give to families. One of the most wonderful smiles you will ever see lights up the face of a young lady who is now a radio presenter. Why not ask the Trust to lend you a copy so that you can see it for yourself?
Donations
The Trustees are grateful to the many trusts and companies throughout the UK who give generously to support the Trust.
Please support the work of the Trust by making a donation, remembering the Trust in your Will, or by becoming a Friend of the Trust with a donation of £10 per annum.
Cheques (payable to The Eyeless Trust) should be sent to:-
The Treasurer
The Eyeless Trust
P O Box 1248
Slough
SL2 3GJ