Services Offered

Vision Therapy Evaluation

This two hour evaluation goes above and beyond ’20/20′ vision.  Dr. Dudley will evaluate how the eyes function and perform.  She uses quantitative methods to assess how the patient performs and has the potential to perform.  These measures relate directly to performance in academics, sports, behavior, and all visually guided tasks. Dr. Dudley recommends a routine eye examination prior to this appointment to assess eye health and baseline glasses prescription. This routine eye exam may be performed by Dr. Dudley or by another optometrist, and it should include dilation and refraction. For patients with brain injury or post concussion problems, a visual field is recommended.

Consultation

One week after the Vision Therapy Evaluation a consultation will be scheduled to review the results of the testing.  Reports are provided which explain the results in detail and a graph shows how the individual performs relative to age-matched normal levels.  Reports are also provided for the referring doctor, pediatrician, primary care doctor, teacher, and any other professional per patient request.

Visual Information Processing Evaluation

Some patients will benefit from further testing involving visual information processing (also called visual perception) to assess how the brain analyzes the data that it collects visually.  How does the patient interpret what they see? How do they connect it to other things that they know? How does it fit into their representation of the world? These analysis skills are critical for everything we do, from driving a car to learning new concepts in school.  Most of all, visual information processing skills are used in reading.  Poor readers may be having difficulty processing the information they are seeing!

Optometric Vision Therapy

Optometric vision therapy is a series of activities programmed by a trained optometrist to remediate visual problems and improve visual skills. These essential skills include eye tracking, teaming, focusing, eye-hand coordination, depth perception, visualization, and visual perception. Efficient visual skills enable a person to learn and are especially important in reading.

Routine Vision Exam

Dr. Dudley performs routine eye examinations to check clarity of vision, eye health, and provide a prescription for glasses.  Dr. Dudley specializes in special needs patients, infants, patients with acquired brain injury, developmental delay, autism, double vision, binocular vision problems, tracking problems, and other visual disorders.  Dr. Dudley does not dispense contact lenses.

Children’s Vision

If your child is struggling in school, especially with reading or writing, vision therapy may be a great avenue to explore. We work with children who cannot focus, team both eyes together, or track correctly (e.g. following a moving target or reading words on a page); our vision therapy program is personalized based on each patient to help improve these visual skills. Some common symptoms of below-average visual skills or a vision disorder include: avoiding reading, difficulty copying from a chalk board, a short attention span, and avoiding sports and games. These represent only the most common symptoms, but of course there are many more—if you think your child might have a vision disorder, please give us a call and we can answer any further questions on this subject.

Concussion/Visual Rehabilitation

After a brain injury we are here to help rebuild and restore your visual skills. Our personalized vision therapy program can help with such symptoms as: double vision, blurriness, dizziness, fatigue, avoidance of bright and busy places, headaches, and many others.
The initial exam for a concussion patient is spread across three separate appointments to perform the most thorough tests while remaining sensitive to patients’ pain and fatigue levels. During these appointments, communication is key! Understanding each patient’s symptoms, struggles, and medical history are extremely important in order to have the best success in vision therapy. Our goal is to help you be able to do the things you love again with the best possible alleviation of aggravating symptoms. Please call us with questions or for more information.

Non-Surgical Correction of Eye Turns

Vision therapy is the best aid, and in some cases, alternative, to surgery for eye turns. Many patients with eye turns require surgical correction, and experience incredible benefits from a successful operation. However, the likelihood that surgical correction of an eye turn will result in perfect, clear and single vision is statistically low—due to the complexity inherent in the anatomy of the eye and the “wiring” of the visual system, many patients who pursue surgical correction still require the aid of vision therapy before and after their procedure. Still others reject the surgical option due to the invasiveness of the procedure, and pursue vision therapy as an alternative. There is no guarantee as to which choice will yield best results—every eye turn is unique. If you are hesitant to pursue surgery, vision therapy may provide a viable alternative and/or supplement to the surgical option. Call us for more information.

Alternative to Patching for Eye Turns

Patching has been a long-standing and mildly successful method for treating eye turns throughout the history of vision treatments. While patching sometimes leads to significant improvements, and even a small handful of our initial activities require patching, the majority of the vision therapy program consists of teaching the brain to use both eyes together as a team—something that “clicks” in vision therapy patients more often than in patients who merely patch with no further aid. For more research on the pros and cons to both patching and vision therapy, visit our Resources tab or the COVD website, and as always feel free to call with any further questions!

Vision and Learning

Perhaps the simplest way to define vision therapy is to think of it as physical therapy for your eyes and brain. Our visual system consists of more than mere eyeballs and what we see—there is a whole complex of muscles, nerves, and connections between the eyes and the brain that makes up our amazing visual system! A healthy system works to keep things in focus, uses both eyes by teaming correctly when focusing, and tracking words on a page or any moving object with relative ease. These skills are all connected to the brain and affect the ways in which it processes the images we see every day. If the visual system is not functioning at its full potential, then our brain has to expend much more energy and effort to observe and process our everyday world accurately. Vision therapy helps to improve these visual skills, and teaches patients to gain the awareness necessary to help the eyes and brain work together efficiently. If you have further questions please give us a call!

Insurance

We are out of network for all insurance providers so we do expect the full cost up front. We do provide forms you can submit to your insurance in order to receive partial to full reimbursement for the exam.

Cancellation/Attendance Policy

If you need to cancel or reschedule your appointment, we request that you do so at least 48 hours prior to your appointment.

A late cancellation or a no-show count as a missed appointment.  In the case that an appointment is cancelled late there may be a $35 fee assessed. In the event that multiple missed appointments occur we may require a deposit or reserve the right to change your spot.

If you are more than 15 minutes late for your appointment, we ask that you reschedule for another time.  We want to be able to give each patient their full therapy session.  If you do not reschedule, this will count as a missed appointment.