Angela Pencheva was born with cerebral palsy. She cannot talk, move or perform fine movements with her hands.

Angela has many friends, has completed her education, is the author of the book “My life – to have a left thumb”, and she is a performer in a group for people with severe physical disabilities under the artistic leadership of theatre director Kristiana Boiadzieva.

Before working with an eye-gaze control system, Angela was using a computer only with the help of her left thumb and a one gram weight with which she pushed some of the keys – although this was a slow process, it enabled her to write her book by using a computer.

For the last two years, Angela has been using her eye-gaze control device Tobii PCEye Go and the software for communication Communicator 5. The latter, provided for her by the foundation “ASSIST – Assistive Technologies”, allowed her to use a computer for many different activities:

• communicating by writing texts which are then read by a synthesized speech software
• using facebook and writing emails
• communicating via Skype and Facebook messenger
• making public presentations
• participating in TV shows, controlling her TV and performing in theatre plays. Angela is the first artist in the world to have had a dialogue on stage with the help of an eye-gaze control system.

This post is also available in Български.