Guidelines for the NLS Program

The following persons are eligible for the NLS program:

1. Blind persons whose visual acuity, as determined by a competent authority, is 20/200 or less in the better eye with correcting glasses, or whose widest diameter of visual field subtends an angular distance no greater than 20 degrees.
2. Persons whose visual disability, with correction and regardless of optical measurement, is certified by a competent authority as preventing the reading of standard printed material.
3. Persons certified by a competent authority as unable to use standard printed materials as a result of physical limitations.
• In cases of blindness, visual disability, or physical limitations, "competent authority" is defined to include doctors of medicine or osteopathy, ophthalmologists, optometrists, registered nurses, therapists, and the professional staff of hospitals, institutions, and public or welfare agencies.
• In the absence of any of these, certification may be made by professional librarians or by any person whose competence under specific circumstances is acceptable to the Library of Congress.
4. Persons certified by a competent authority as having a reading disability resulting from organic dysfunction and of sufficient severity to prevent their reading of printed material in a normal manner.
• In the case of reading disability from organic dysfunction, competent authority is defined as doctors of medicine or osteopathy, who may consult with colleagues in associated disciplines.

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