2015 Tennessee Code
Title 71 - Welfare
Chapter 4 - Programs and Services for Persons With Disabilities
Part 21 - Tennessee Council for the Deaf, Deaf-Blind, and Hard of Hearing
§ 71-4-2101 - Part definitions.

(1) A "deaf-blind person" means the same as an "individual who is deaf-blind" and both mean any individual:

(A) (i) Who has a central visual acuity of 20/200 or less in the better eye with corrective lenses, or a field defect such that the peripheral diameter of visual field subtends an angular distance no greater than twenty degrees (20 degrees), or a progressive visual loss having a prognosis leading to one (1) or both these conditions;

(ii) Who has a chronic hearing impairment so severe that most speech cannot be understood with optimum amplification, or a progressive hearing loss having a prognosis leading to this condition; and

(iii) For whom the combination of impairments described in subdivisions (1)(A)(i) and (ii) cause extreme difficulty in attaining independence in daily life activities, achieving psychosocial adjustment, or obtaining a vocation;

(B) Who despite the inability to be measured accurately for hearing and vision loss due to cognitive or behavioral constraints, or both, can be determined through functional and performance assessment to have severe hearing and visual disabilities that cause extreme difficulty in attaining independence in daily life activities, achieving psychosocial adjustment, or obtaining vocational objectives; or

(C) Meets such other requirements as the secretary may prescribe by regulation;

(2) A "deaf person" is defined as one whose hearing is totally impaired or one whose hearing, with or without amplification, is so seriously impaired that the primary means of receiving spoken language is through visual input such as, but not limited to, speechreading, sign language, finger spelling, or writing; and

(3) "Secretary" means the United States secretary of education.