Importance of Screening and Treating Visual Issues in Occupational Therapy
Visual-information processing is a critical component of learning.
This summary looks at the study titled “Vision, Visual-Information Processing, and Academic Performance Among Seventh-Grade Schoolchildren: A More Significant Relationship Than We Thought?” This study gives good rationale as to why occupational therapists should be helping to screen and treat visual issues.
If a child is not performing well due to difficulties caused by vision deficits, they may become less motivated and less likely to participate. Those children with better visual function performed better academically as compared to those with visual deficits.
The history of visual studies points to how critical an analysis of vision is, as vision deficits point to a series of problems, including poor academic achievement, reading, handwriting, activities, and motor skills that require hand-eye coordination.[1] This is why it is critical for occupational therapists to also be evaluating vision during evaluations and throughout therapy.
In the current study, “over half of the children failed the MCT vision screening, with a similar percentage failing in the Visual Efficiency items of the screening. Even among the proficient readers, a high percentage revealed visual deficits.”[2] Visual deficits are common and should be looked out for, especially in occupational therapy, where it is the job of therapists to understand and identify what factors are affecting a child’s quality of life and performance.[3]
Implications
Due to how common visual deficiencies are, the study recommends that “screening for visual efficiency status may be warranted, at least with respect to children with unexplained difficulty in coping with the reading demands placed on them for school learning,” as well as for those children with unexpected lower performance academically.[4]
Although screening done by occupational therapists is not a substitute for an actual eye exam at the optometrist, a screening can allow for early intervention in the case of any visual problems. It also allows the therapist to consider vision when creating a therapy plan and those children that struggle with vision efficiency skills can be referred “to a vision care specialist for assessment before proceeding with therapy to enhance visual-perception performance.”[5]
Be sure to check out the “Becoming a Vision Aware Therapist” inservice under the “Inservice tab on the employee portal to learn more about screening and treating for vision in therapy.
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1. Goldstand, Sarina, et al., “Vision, Visual-Information Processing, and Academic Performance Among Seventh-Grade Schoolchildren: A More Significant Relationship Than We Thought?” The American Journal of Occupational Therapy, 59, no. 4 (2005): 378-379, https://doi.org/10.5014/ajot.59.4.377.
2. Goldstand, “Vision, Visual-Information Processing,” 383.
3. Ibid, 384.
4. Ibid, 386.
5. Ibid, 386.
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Goldstand, Sarina, et al., “Vision, Visual-Information Processing, and Academic Performance Among Seventh-Grade Schoolchildren: A More Significant Relationship Than We Thought?” The American Journal of Occupational Therapy, 59, no. 4 (2005): 377-389, https://doi.org/10.5014/ajot.59.4.377.