Pediatrics & Amblyopia

One in four children has a vision problem that affects learning — a vision problem can sometimes be misinterpreted as or coincide with disinterest, sleepiness, dyslexia or ADHD. Eyesight (the ability to receive input through the eye) is not the same as vision (the ability to efficiently and accurately process and understand what that input is). Recognizing this distinction has monumental implications. Even a child with 20/20 eyesight can have a vision issue at the core of their learning problem. Being able to see the eye chart is just one of 17 different visual skills necessary for comfortable reading and learning.

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To complicate matters, vision-related learning problems share the same symptoms as countless learning disability diagnoses, including:

• Difficulty concentrating

• Taking far too long and/or making mistakes when copying information from the board to the notebook

• Rereading or skipping lines of print

• Letter reversals

• Difficulty recognizing words

• Short attention span

• Poor reading comprehension

• Poor handwriting

• Slow completion of work

• Loss of interest in reading

• Reduced visual memory - can't remember what we read, or difficulty remembering how a word is spelled

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What types of pediatric services do you offer?

We know how important it is to have a comprehensive eye exam for our pediatric population.  Vision is crucial for learning and playing sports and it is so important to make sure that not only the eyes see clearly, but that they see comfortably and efficiently so that vision is not a barrier to learning.  We offer comprehensive pediatric eye examinations for kids of any age with or without a history of brain injury.

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How is a pediatric comprehensive exam different from a neuro-optometric evaluation? 

Not every patient needs a comprehensive neuro-optometric evaluation or visual processing examination.  However, every pediatric patient needs a comprehensive, dilated eye exam to evaluate for any abnormalities like amblyopia (lazy eye) and screening of the oculomotor system to ensure overall normal binocular vision.  Binocular vision is the ability for both eyes to focus, coordinate, and track together efficiently. Underlying binocular vision disorders like accommodative insufficiency and convergence insufficiency are common in up to 30% of the pediatric population and can go undetected on a routine eye exams if not appropriately screened. Binocular vision disorders can occur in kids who have 20/20 vision and normal eye health, but cause difficulties with reading including headaches, fatigue, inattention, re-reading, losing one's place while reading, and more.  We offer RightEye eye tracking technology to evaluate what the eyes are doing when a child is reading and how accurate the eye movements are for reading.