A blind physiotherapist treats a patient last month.

PHYSIOTHERAPY – a form of massage treatment that relieves muscle strain and alleviates the effects of illness or injury – is emerging as a job opportunity for people who are blind or have defective vision, experts in the field say.

Traditionally, blind people could earn a living through handicrafts and craftsmanship, often in cane, gunny, jute or cotton wares. But lately, amid increased demand for technological devices, customer demand for these artefacts has cooled.

Physiotherapy does not require visual acuity, but strong hands and a familiarity with anatomy and biology.

U Zaw Htwe Oo, a teacher and physiotherapist at the School for the Blind in Kyeemyindaing, who is himself blind, said Myanmar people with vision defects could usefully take up this profession.

“To my dismay, I am aware of discrimination towards physiotherapy. But I’m proud to have learned it,” he said.

U Zaw Htwe Oo studied the Japanese method of physiotherapy in Japan in 2000 while on a scholarship provided by the government of Japan to two blind students in Myanmar.

“We haven’t taught physio as a vocational subject because we knew we would be discriminated against when trying to make a living at it. We learned it in order to be able to hold our heads up as professionals in society,” he said.

Ma Sopheria, another Japanese scholarship student, agreed that training in physiotherapy is a valid objective for the blind, and the way to a better life.
“It is a kind of medicine chest that helps those who know it to manage their own health as well as helping others,” she said.

She learned the technique in order to treat her bedridden father, and it introduced her to healthy living, she said, adding that she intended to pursue her studies to the doctorate level.

Japanese physio-therapists offered training courses on physiotherapy in 1996 and 2000.

The principal of the school, U Lwin Oo, said students were slow to take up physiotherapy, associating it with lower status.

The Kyeemindaing school offers a training course that currently has more than 20 students, and also runs a physio clinic. But the school says it can offer little in postgraduate support.

“Our school is only for educational and vocational teaching. We cannot help former students throughout their life because we need to care for new students. We can only introduce them to associations that are familiar with their situation,” U Lwin Oo said.

Ko Bo Bo Pe Win, who runs the Genky Japan-Myanmar physiotherapy clinic, which employs blind physiotherapists, agreed that there should be more dedicated workplaces for the blind.

In many cases students, unable to find jobs, are dependent on their families and lead their lives feeling useless and hopeless, he said.

“We want to encourage and support blind people to have a better life. We want their dreams to come true so that they feel useful to society. The clinic isn’t for business, but for support,” he said.

He said he had recruited unemployed blind people familiar with physiotherapy to work at the clinic, and many customers said their treatment was better than that provided by sighted physiotherapists. Genky plans to open more clinics managed by blind people. “They are visually impaired, but there’s nothing wrong with their listening or tactile skills,” he said.