Services

What is Vision Therapy?

Everyone is familiar with physiotherapy and speech therapy. Just as these help heal motor functions and improve speaking issues, there is vision therapy to help how we process the visual information coming through our eyes. 

Often when we think of vision, the term 20/20 comes up. This tells us how clearly one can read the letters on the eye chart. However, there are 17 different visual skills required just for reading and learning! These include being able to point both of our eyes on the same word at the same time, focusing on the print to keep it clear, moving the eyes along the printed text properly, and being able to return to the start of the next line quickly and accurately. These skills also come into play when driving (judging speed, distance and steering appropriately), and in sports performance (catching, throwing and monitoring the players’ movements). 

Therefore, vision involves much more than just how clearly we can see the letters on the eye chart. If any of our other visual skills are not functioning properly this will affect how well we can accomplish our daily tasks. The result can be fatigue, headaches, loss of interest, poor concentration. Fortunately, Optometric Vision Therapy can help rehabilitate these visual skills and reduce the associated symptoms. 

The sessions are typically 50 minutes in length and comprise of various activities that are tailored to the needs of the specific patient. These can include exercises involving specific lenses, prisms or filters, eye-hand coordination training, or specific computer programs. 

To ensure that the new visual habits become well ingrained, our patients are given home activities to do in addition to the in-office sessions. The more you can do at home, the more quickly we can get you back to where you need to be. The length of the vision therapy program is based on each individual case, and how much practice the patient can do at home. This is a team effort. We do vision therapy with you, not to you.