A deafblind person in Sweden has a right to get support from society, just as people with other disabilities or in need of help for other reasons. There are different forms of support: transport service, (taxi at the same price as bus fares), home help service, personal assistance, technical aids, home adaptation, special group homes, pension, disability allowance (compensation for higher living costs because of the disability), habilitation, rehabilitation, supplementary wages (the government pays part of the salary for a disabled person), technical aids at work ...
With support of this kind many deafblind persons can lead fairly normal lives - alone or with their families, maybe in service flats. Some deafblind people, about as many among other disabled people, are able to find work. Computer technology can give deafblind people better chances to do for instance office work.
There are some governmental and municipal resources especially for deafblind people:
Every county is obliged by law to arrange interpreter service for deaf, deafblind and hard of hearing people. The service is paid for by the government, and the deafblind users do not have to pay anything. They can call the interpreter centre and ask for interpretation when they feel they need it - for meetings, shopping, studies, leisure, seeing a doctor ... However, the authorities decide whether the deafblind person can have interpretation or not. There is a shortage of interpreters which will last for several years.
The deafblind interpreter (interpreter for deafblind people) helps the deafblind person to keep in touch with people and events around him; thus the interpreter is very important. Deafblind interpretation is not only translating between sign language and speech, or interpreting speech in some other way (by writing or by clear speech). The interpreter must also keep the deafblind person informed of what is happening around him; who is coming, who is going, who is talking, what does the room look like ... The interpreter also acts as a guide if needed.
The training of interpreters for deafblind people is the same as for sign language interpreters (for sighted deaf). They all must know sign language as well as other communication methods that deafblind people use. The students also study civics, Swedish, ethics, psychology, handicap issues and politics, and Braille. They get some knowledge of eye and ear diseases and of technical aids, and they are trained to guide blind people. Including the time for learning sign language, the training is four years.
Deafblind people - as well as other disabled people - get free technical aids, for instance vibrating alarm clocks, fire alarms with vibrators, vibrating thermometers, hearing aids, eye glasses, magnifying glasses, white canes, Braille watches. (There are very few technical aids exclusively for deafblind people.)
Technical aids are paid for by the county authorities, except text telephones (TTYs). TTYs are paid for with a special government grant. Deafblind persons generally get a computer with a telephone programme and a modem as a text telephone, with the necessary adaptation (Braille display or large screen). A word processor and a printer are also considered part of the telephone equipment.
A deaf or deafblind person who has got a TTY, also can get a smaller, cheaper TTY to place with a hearing relative or close friend, that is, a person with whom he has frequent contact by phone.
(Swedish text telephones, used by sighted deaf people, follow the same technical standard as ordinary computer modems; thus a deafblind person can phone a sighted deaf without using an intermediary service.)
Deafblind people with other disabilities can live in group homes with staff to give them permanent support and rehabilitation.
Deafblind Braille readers get a small newsletter every day of the week except Sunday. Twice a week there is a larger magazine in Braille, large print and sound cassette. In the newsletter you can read the most important daily news in short items. In the magazine, there are longer articles, giving background facts to the short news items.
The National Braille Library has a Print-to-Braille service for deafblind people. A deafblind person can send printed matters of almost any kind letters, articles, recipes, (not whole books) to the library and get it printed in Braille. This service is free.
Low vision centres and hearing-aid centres in every county are responsible for the necessary technical aids for deafblind people (glasses, hearing aids, other aids for everyday life). They also train deafblind people in new ways of communicating and reading when sight or hearing diminish.
Mo Gård Resource Centre, 200 kilometers south of Stockholm, is a rehabilitation centre for deaf and deafblind people with additional disabilities. The centre also initiates research and development in the area of deafblindness and deafblind services.
Mo Gård is also responsible for The Swedish Resource Centre for Matters Regarding Deafblindness. The Resource Centre supports counties in their efforts to develop activities for the deafblind. Their main tasks are guidance, education, consultation and information regarding deafblindness.
Vocational rehabilitation
There are labour market institutes, among others in Uppsala north of Stockholm and in Malmö in the south of Sweden that rehabilitate disabled people with the aim of getting them employment.
Children with visual and hearing impairments are usually mainstreamed in regular schools: deaf deafblind children in deaf schools, hearing impaired children in ordinary schools, sometimes in special hearing classes, deafblind children with learning disabilities in special schools for children with learning disabilities.
There is one special school open for congenitally deafblind children, Åsbackaskolan in Gnesta. In Gnesta there is also a resource centre which supports congenitally deafblind children in other schools.