This type of therapy has been around since the early 1800's but was not actively implemented until the mid 1900's. One type of treatment used in vision therapy that you may be aware of is the patching of an eye when the patient has a "lazy eye". Vision therapy is like physical therapy for the visual system, including the eyes and brain parts that control vision. Unlike eyeglasses the vision therapy aims to teach the visual system to correct itself. Vision therapy is a controversial topic in vision care with not all eye doctors believing in its effectiveness.
When we saw the "developmental optometrist" he did a variety of tests with the children, discussed their medical challenges and then discussed options with us. Out of the 5 kids, 3 of them had 20/20 vision (which we were aware of) however they still presented with balance issues, coordination challenges, dyslexia, comprehension challenges when reading, head aches, double vision, etc. The doctor tried different shaped lenses (concave and convex), prisms and filters in the form of glasses and with some you were able to see sudden improvement with their balance and ability to catch a ball. The doctor was also very upfront and didn't claim to be able to fix everything. He felt that by prescribing glasses with different shaped lenses he could give a slight improvement for a couple children but until their seizures are under control he wouldn't do anything else. For the other 3 kids he felt they would benefit from glasses that help work on the deficit present in their eyesight and 30 weeks of vision therapy.
At vision therapy the kids did different exercises with their eyes, for some exercises one eye was patched while the other eye preformed the exercise and some exercises included both eyes. They did exercises involving reading up close and at a distance, for those who haven't mastered reading they used pictures. They also worked on catching or hitting a ball (fortunately the ball was attached to a string suspended from the ceiling so it wasn't a game of fetch). There was eye tracking exercises and a computer game also. The hour long therapy appointment went by extremely fast and the kids enjoyed themselves. We were sent home with homework that we practice daily until our next appointment.
We were told that we won't see immediate results but we are looking forward to positive results. Have you our your child tried "vision therapy"? How did it work for you?
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