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“Reading cards”
Lesson on egg sucking
Illiteracy isn’t the starting point but the reasons for are.
S 78 of the Welfare Reform Act 2012 requires a person’s ability to carry out the daily living activities to be limited by a ‘physical or mental condition’.
‘…it must follow that points can only be awarded in respect of illiteracy if that illiteracy is linked to a physical or mental condition limiting that person’s ability to read or which has prevented that person from learning to read’.
CPIP/777/2016 is helpful to proper investigation - Rightsnet link seems to be broken
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5979ad8ee5274a7373000002/CPIP_0777_2016-00.pdf
Illiteracy isn’t the starting point but the reasons for are.
I left the obvious learning difficulties implicit. My apologies.
Dan, I think that you may have asked for/received the wrong cards. They look like eyesight tests rather than the reading tests. I’ve seen the Atos ones used at assessments (don’t have a copy) and they are genuine text that tests reading ability - I wandered down a country lane on a glorious summer day when out of nowhere… type stuff.
Not strictly on point but I’m reminded of this:
One of the first PIP appeals I did generated a report from a health professional on a client who said she was blind. The report said that my client could read up to line 3 on the Sussex chart and I think it was inferred that she either had no difficulties reading or needed only aids to read or whatever it was as a result (I can’t really remember to be honest).
I had no idea what the Sussex chart was, so I rang up Atos and asked. They said they had no idea. I asked some local opticians what it was - none of them had any idea. I expect that I probably made some submission to the effect that very little weight could be placed on this finding when nobody could explain what it meant.
A couple of years later, I was at my opticians and I saw this on his desk: http://www.sussex-vision.co.uk/near-tests/reading-test-type-laminated
Dan, I think that you may have asked for/received the wrong cards. They look like eyesight tests rather than the reading tests. I’ve seen the Atos ones used at assessments (don’t have a copy) and they are genuine text that tests reading ability - I wandered down a country lane on a glorious summer day when out of nowhere… type stuff.
Thanks Billy
I have asked for an internal review of the FOI because I suspected this might be the case.
Haven’t had the opportunity to respond until now but yes you’ve clearly been given duff stuff there. Maybe their cognition was tested by asking them to sound out increasingly complex sequences of vowels and consonants!!!
Elliots post is interesting to me too as the problem with assessment providers doing functional assessments outside of their direct area of experience is that those tests are in no way administered correctly. So, I’ve had ATOS/IAS assert that a Snellen was definitely done properly even when they can’t tell me the size of the room and confirm the distance from the claimant to the chart and when the claimant says a bulb was out! Near vision tests are even more inexact in the sense that in most cases you get asked to hold stuff like Sussex yourself after a specific measurement has been done. Chances of the assessor doing that measurement seem to me to be likely close to nil. Chances of an assessor having a tape measure to hand seem well and truly close to nil. Would be genuinely interested to hear of anyone who’s had a client who was given a Sussex or Jaeger after said measurement was done.
Of course the direct consequence is that you don’t read it at a set distance. You read it by bringing it closer. Amazing what severely sight-impaired people can see when allowed by a paramedic or OT to bring a chart within a few centimetres of their eyes! One is reminded of Life Of Brian for some reason 😊
Don’t even start me on the so-called “whisper test”.
My reply to the internal review has just arrived.
They insist they don’t use any other cards.
Ah well my appeal should be fun 😊