PATCHING VS VISION THERAPY

Traditionally, placing a patch (occlusion or penalization) over the better eye was the widely used method to treat amblyopia. Theoretically, this treatment sounds good, as it strengthens the weaker eye without interference from the other eye.

Unfortunately, training the brain and eyes to work together isn’t so simple. With patching, the brain finds other ways to compensate for the lack of vision while an active vision therapy program is designed to guide and retrain the eyes and brain to work together with clear direction.

Another problem with patching is that children may resist wearing it, as it draws attention and may affect their confidence. On the other hand, children who undergo vision therapy are likely to experience a confidence boost as visual skills are refined.

CureSee vision therapy works customizes the exercise as per the need of patient, these prescribed and monitored exercises aimed at developing visual skills and processing. The course of vision therapy sessions is typically supplemented by exercises to be done daily at home on your computer.

While patching was traditionally the default treatment for amblyopia, vision therapy is now a much better option—and for several reasons. The exercises performed throughout the vision therapy program are meant to teach the patient new visual skills in an engaging and motivating way until the learned skill becomes automatic. Vision therapy thus outweighs the benefits of eye patching.

While patching for amblyopia improves monocular function by providing visual input to the amblyopic eye, vision therapy can treat the underlying binocular dysfunction that accompanies amblyopia.

Vision therapy can focus on increasing accommodation, improving accuracy of oculomotor skills, increasing vergence ranges, improvement of spatial perception, and breaking suppression and eccentric fixation. The treatment goal is for the patient to effortlessly function with sound visual skills at a high level of binocularity. This high level of binocularity helps improve vision and will prevent the regression of visual acuity after amblyopia treatment has stopped.

The goals for amblyopia therapy should not be based solely on visual acuity, but also on the function of the binocular system. Amblyopia treatment should not be considered complete until the visual acuity of the amblyopic eye is normalized under binocular viewing conditions. To achieve good binocular vision after amblyopia treatment has stopped, it is important to treat all aspects of the binocular system. With this therapy approach in mind, practitioners can be confident their patients with amblyopia will receive the best care and achieve the best visual outcomes.

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