VERA Vision Screening

VERA can be used to screen for vision problems in school-age children and adults with mild traumatic brain injury or PTSD.

School Vision Screening
Even after school vision screening is passed, occupational therapists frequently have a sense that vision is interfering with a student's behavior or performance. This assumption is often correct because:

Common vision problems are frequently missed, especially when traditional eye charts are used. When vision difficulties are identified, vision care may be delayed or absent. In addition, follow-up on unfulfilled referrals and reports to teachers are often too time-consuming for school nurses to accomplish. With VERA, referral rates can be improved with automated follow-up and screening reports to teachers, occupational therapists and administration. Students who failed vision screening and have not seen an eye doctor are no longer beneath the radar.

Many school vision screening programs contain a misleading near vision test, which can mistakenly label a student as "visually OK" even though they may not be able to sustain clarity when reading or performing close tasks. VERA's routine screening identifies all the causes of poor near vision without this potentially misleading test.

Millions of children who suffer with "vision skills" problems based in muscular control of tracking, focusing and eye teaming have been missed by routine school screening. These children can have poor reading ability, handwriting problems or chronic behavioral issues and may be mislabeled with dyslexia or ADHD. Only a small fraction of students with vision skills issues are now identified, usually during a chance encounter with a practitioner who tests for and treats these issues.

Missed vision problems place a burden not only on students, but on teachers and therapists who need to understand the components of learning issues and to direct support. That's why it's so important to have standardized routine vision screening, efficient reporting and follow-up and the first reliable, universal screening for vision skills. Learn more about vision skills…

Screening for vision problems secondary to mild traumatic brain injury or stress disorders
The efficiency of the visual process and the integration of vision with other senses can affect many activities of daily living. It is important for occupational therapists to be able to not only screen for visual acuity, but for vision problems which manifest with ABI. These include:

Accommodative disorders which impede activities requiring visual concentration on small objects or print at a close distance.

Binocular vision disorders which may cause double vision, interfere with eye-hand coordination and mobility tasks or cause eyestrain or even loss of vision. These disorders can contribute to difficulty with activities of daily living like driving, playing sports, reaching for objects or pouring liquids.

Eye movement disorders which affect a patient's ability to read quickly, comfortably, and with adequate comprehension and attention.

Utilizing information gathered during the vision screening
After vision screening the therapist should understand:

The treatment options available for visual acuity, visual efficiency and visual information processing disorders

Which problems require treatment by an eye care professional and which problems could be managed by the therapist

The compensatory interventions available to help the client function more effectively in spite of the presence of these vision problems

How to provide direct remedial intervention

How to co-manage the vision rehabilitation of clients with an optometrist (consult the College of Optometrists in Vision Development)

VTA recommends Vision Education Seminars to provide therapists with a comprehensive understanding of vision and the therapy process in children, and an understanding and managing visual deficits after acquired brain injury. Seminars about care of children include screening techniques and treatment options such as compensatory strategies, therapy for eye movement and visual processing disorders and rehabilitative techniques. Seminars for care after acquired brain injury include vision disorders and their functional implications. Treatment options are addressed, including vision therapy, helping patients compensate for double vision, eye movement disorders, other direct intervention techniques, and establishing a vision rehabilitation service.

Appropriate ages for the VERA screening:
All Vera tests can be done at any age level except for the vision skills accommodative flexibility test, where the normal decrease in focusing ability in adults over age 35 affects test results. VERA will prompt if a subject is older than those within VERA's database and compare screening results to the oldest subjects in the database. Since visual abilities plateau near Vera's current upper database range, a good determination of visual skill can still be made. When a subject is younger than VERA's database, a developmental lag may be mistaken for a vision skills issue, and the screening is not recommended. See the VERA User Guide for additional information on interpreting the skills screening report.