Vision Therapy For Children With Special Needs
Being the parent of a child with special needs has both rewarding and challenging aspects, especially when it comes to prioritizing your little one’s eye care and visual needs.
In the US, public school data reveals that approximately 14% of all students aged 3 to 21 receive special education services (this doesn’t reflect privately educated special needs children). Many of these children display certain behaviors thought to be caused by their disability but may actually stem from an undetected and underlying vision problem.
Conditions and disabilities are categorized into four main areas:
- Developmental — Down syndrome, autism, dyslexia, and processing disorders
- Behavioral/Emotional — ADHD, mental health, or oppositional defiant disorder
- Physical — Muscular dystrophy, multiple sclerosis, chronic asthma, and epilepsy
- Sensory Impaired — Blind, visually impaired, deaf, or hearing-impaired
Vision Conditions and Special Needs
Thirty-five different areas of the brain are involved in processing visual information and as much as 80% of sensory information is relayed through the visual system. This means that problems with the neuro-visual system can affect a child’s ability to read, write, and complete other daily tasks. Children with special needs are more likely to have vision problems than others. Examples include:
- Nearsightedness (myopia)
- Farsightedness (hyperopia)
- Eye turns (strabismus)
- Eye focusing (accommodation)
- Lazy eye (amblyopia)
- Eye teaming and tracking
- Binocular coordination
- Depth perception
- Visual information-processing
The team at Opto-mization NeuroVisual Performance is experienced with working with special needs children and can help your child improve their visual skills and reach their full potential.