Thursday 25 October 2012

When reading becomes difficult

St Peter reading, painted in 1466 by Friedrich Herlin
(public domain image)
It can be so frustrating to struggle with reading small print. The trouble is that as we age, even larger fonts start to cause problems. Reading glasses do not always provide a full solution, especially for people who are affected by age-related macular degeneration or other eye conditions.

When I joined the Squidoo Book Club, I was given a challenge to write a lens either on a book or books or on book-related products for book lovers. I thought that a good topic to explore would be gifts for elderly people and/or people with impaired vision, who love books.

Thinking particularly about older people, I wanted to stay away from the ebook concept. An elderly book lover will most likely have collected a lot of books over a lifetime. Many of these will have sentimental value. Some books, particularly those published in the 19th century, may be set in really small type.

Therefore, I wanted to look at products, which would help people to continue to be able read hard-copy books. Researching this topic was an eye-opener! From a hands-free reading magnifying glass costing less than $30 to a state-of-the-art desktop low vision magnifier costing over $4000, there is a huge range of products. 

Products in the $75-300 range include high definition reading lights, halogen reading lamps, LED reading lamps with magnifying lenses, and portable digital magnifiers. 

If you know someone who is struggling to continue reading due to eyesight problems and would like to find a gift to help them, why not check out my article for inspiration: http://www.squidoo.com/best-gifts-for-elderly-and-visually-impaired-book-lovers

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