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Focus Group Discussions as a Tool for Developing a Health Education Programme for Elderly Persons with Visual Impairment

This article describes the experience of using focus group discussions as a tool for developing an occupation-based health education programme for elderly persons with age-related macular degeneration (AMD). Focus group methodology is one way to learn how a particular target group describes and perceives their disease, including how the disease has changed their daily occupations. This focus group study gave us an understanding of the problems in daily occupations faced by people who suffer from AMD and important indications and ideas for further planning and evaluation of the health education programme. To further develop and improve the programme and to maximize the success of the programme, focus group methodology was also used as a tool for process evaluation. The group turned their attention to the programme itself, their reaction to it, and whether it was successful or not. The results indicated that the participants were, on the whole, pleased with the content of the programme, but they did not understand all the information provided. Several suggestions for improving the programme were put forward. Finally, focus group discussions were used to develop an evaluative instrument. Focus group discussions were thus found to be a versatile and invaluable tool for developing a health education programme.