Visual Impairment Center (CZV)

The Visual Defects Center is the only medical facility in the Czech Republic specialized in comprehensive care for the visually impaired of all ages.

The department has been caring for visually impaired patients for almost 70 years and currently employs a team of experienced professionals in the fields of ophthalmology, clinical psychology, visual therapy, special pedagogy, social and professional counseling, in cooperation with an experienced team of nurses. Externally, the workplace cooperates with a specialized optician.

The Visual Impairment Center provides its patients with the following services in particular:

• General ophthalmological outpatient care, including pediatric ophthalmology - diagnostics, therapy, correction of refractive errors - ophthalmologists with experience and problems of visually impaired people.
• Trial and prescription special optical aids (SOP) in the complete assortment of the VZP code list - aspherical magnifiers, hyperocular corrections, telescope systems, prismatic monoculars (CZV is a designated workplace for prescribing SOPs).
• Static perimetry on the Humphrey computer perimeter and for patients of fellow ophthalmologists or other specialists - neurologists, endocrinologists, etc.
• Application soft contact lenses even the youngest children.
• Functional eye examination in children in the preverbal period (ie from 0-3 years) and in patients with combined disabilities by the method of preferential vision using special tests, monitoring the spontaneous manifestations of the child in response to visual stimuli. Examination focused on crowding difficulties, examination of color vision and contrast sensitivity.
• Trial electronic (so-called television loot) magnifying compensatory aids - both camera and computer, an objective assessment of their suitability with regard to the patient's diagnosis, the degree and nature of his visual impairment, his mental and manual abilities and social conditions, including the issuance of appropriate recommendations.
• Training the skills needed to efficient use optical and electronic aids.
• Skills training to adapt normal daily activities to the loss of visual functions, recommendations for adjusting the work and home environment.
• Psychological diagnostics and psychotherapy children and adults with visual impairments.
• Social Services - advice on entitlement to benefits and benefits resulting from visual impairment.
• Advice on early care and visual stimulation children with severe and combined visual impairments in cooperation with early care centers.
• Special pedagogical counseling about appropriate educational guidance, type and method of education, contacts to schools and SPC (special pedagogical centers) for visually impaired children.
• Professional advice - recommendation of the most suitable job, mediation of contact to the rehabilitation and retraining workplace.
• Contacts for specialized workplaces organizations of the blind and partially sighted - Early Care Centers, Early Care EDA, Rehabilitation and Retraining Center Dědina, Guide Dog Training Center Jinonice, Home for the Visually Impaired Palata, Tyfloservis, Tyflocenrum, Tyflokabinet, etc.
• Sales of all accessories for CZK for their users, including artificial tears, the sale of nutritional supplements aimed at eye nutrition.

The Center for Visual Impairments is located in the southeastern part of the University Hospital in Motol in a separate pavilion No. 16.

Office hours:

Mon-Thu: 8-15 Fri: 8-14
Telefon: 224 436 057, 774 436 057

Most of the services of the Visual Defects Center are covered by health insurance. We have contracts with all existing health insurance companies. We examine patients by prior arrangement.

In addition to the standard equipment of ophthalmology clinics, the workplace is equipped with a Humprey static perimeter, complete sets of optical and electronic compensatory aids for testing and visual training of visually impaired patients, special diagnostic tests and stimulating aids for diagnosing and stimulating visual functions, especially in severely visually impaired children. For children and patients with combined disabilities, we also have a portable automatic refractometer to examine the refractive parameters of the eye. We have a modern fundus camera for photo documentation of findings on the anterior eye segment and especially on the ocular background. At the workplace, it is possible to try orientation, signaling and support white sticks for the visually impaired and deafblind included in the VZP code list.

The Visual Defects Center is a designated ophthalmological society (ČOS) for prescribing special optical aids and at the same time entrusted ČOS with methodical guidance and training of S4 ophthalmologists - prescribing special optical aids in individual regions throughout the Czech Republic. The staff of the Visually Impaired Center occasionally lectures and publishes their knowledge and experience in the care of the visually impaired. He participates in a large number of most professional events organized by ČOS. Physicians are members of ČOS JEP and most of the professional societies within it, such as the Czech Glaucoma Society, the Czech Society of Pediatric Ophthalmology and Strabology, etc. The Association of Visual Therapists os therapists working at the Visual Impairment Center are its leading members.

The workplace did not emerge all at once, but developed slowly. Its beginning was the establishment of a school eye clinic at the physicist of the capital city of Prague in 1940. This started professional care for the eyesight of Prague school children. In addition, the school ophthalmologist searched all schools in Prague for children with various visual defects and disorders, or with eye diseases. School ophthalmologist MUDr. Bohumil Fafl (1907 -1998) took care of the establishment of the first school for visually impaired children in Prague in 1943. At first, there were 2 classes "for eye examination", established at the primary school in Štěpánská Street. In 1945, it was possible to establish an independent school for visually impaired children in Prague, the first of its kind in our country, in the building of a former villa in Prague - Vinohrady, in Koperníkov Street No. 12. An ophthalmic school outpatient clinic was temporarily placed in the school building and gradually transformed into the ophthalmopedic department of the ÚNV-ÚNZ capital city of Prague and relocated in 1952 to a nearby building of the former villa in Koperníkov ul. . In 8, this institute became part of the ÚNZ-NVP Children's University Hospital with a polyclinic, later the University Hospital in Motol. The Institute of Ophthalmology introduced an annual screening examination of school children under the age of 1953, which was performed by instructed nurses at schools in all districts of Prague. He paid special attention to children with visually impaired degrees of various degrees. Schools of all types were set up for them - from kindergartens to grammar schools. These schools have become a model for the establishment of analogous school facilities in various cities of our state and abroad. In all these schools, the school ophthalmologist performed professional medical supervision during visual activities and during the physical education of children. Close cooperation with teachers and educators of visually impaired children became necessary. In the 15s, the name of the workplace was changed to the Institute for the Correction of Visual Defects. The head of MUDr. Bohumil. Fafl ran the department until 60, in the years 1970 -1970 she was the head of MUDr. Cecilie Drastíková. The head of the service, MUDr. Stanislav Rodný (1981-1946), who headed the department from 2001 to 1981. During his tenure, the department moved first to Kaprova Street after the Department of Phoniatrics of the University Hospital in Motol and then in 2001 to Bělehradská Street and in the same year changed its name to Visual Defects Center. In 1996, the workplace moved to its current location in Hall 1999 on the premises of the University Hospital in Motol. During the eighties and nineties, CZV expanded its scope to patients of all ages and became a comprehensive medical center for the care of the visually impaired. Since 16, MUDr. Jitka Řehořová. In January 2001, the Visual Impairment Center was attached to the Eye Clinic for Children and Adults, 2002nd Faculty of Medicine, Charles University. Since January 2, Centrum zrakových vad, sro has been a non-governmental medical facility with executives, Dr. Řehořová, MD, and Filip Beránek, MD, and its operations and all activities have been preserved.