Strabismus vision therapy is a treatment procedure that people with strabismus can take, most especially children with congenital strabismus. It is a program that involves visual activities that are specially designed to correct vision problems as well as develop visual skills. The objective of strabismus vision therapy is not only to compensate for vision issues like the function of corrective glasses and lenses, but it also aims to train the who visual system, including the eyes and the brain, to fix itself. Hence, strabismus vision therapy is recommended to patients before and after an eye surgery.
Individuals with strabismus will have issues in their binocular vision as their uneven eyes makes them incapable of using them both at the same time.
Sometimes eyeglasses, contact lenses, and even surgery is not enough for people to regain their use of binocular vision and this is where strabismus vision therapy becomes helpful. Strabismus vision therapy employs several devices in order to accomplish its objectives and some of them are lenses, filters, prisms, computerized visual activities, and non-computerized viewing instruments. It may also use other non-medical things such as metronomes, balance boards, balls, and other devices in the personalized therapy program.
Strabismus vision therapy is also called other names like orthoptics, visual therapy, vision training, visual training, or simply VT. They are usually done by optometrists. There are even optometrists who specialize in children’s vision as well as vision development and they are known as pediatric optometrists, behavioral optometrists, or developmental optometrists.
The logic behind strabismus vision therapy lies in the concept of neuroplasticity. It means that the brain has the capability to change its structure and function as a result of an external stimulus. Latest studies have proven that these neurological changes can also be done in adults as well and not just among children. Considering these information, strabismus vision therapy can assist in fixing conditions that are related to visual perception, vision function, and vision development. Apart from strabismus, the other eye problems that may be fixed with vision therapy are visual-perceptual disorders, vision problems resulting from developmental disabilities, vision problems resulting from acquired brain injury like stroke, amblyopia, and eye movement disorders.
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