Vision Therapy for 8 year old?
Has anyone done Vision Therapy thru Berkeley Biopic clinic? And did they find it helpful for their child? I also heard about a place called Visual Eyes in Pleasanton that has a pretty intensive program where you go 18 sessions. I'd love to hear any experiences. My son has dyslexia but most t's mostly the visual tracking and ocular motility that seems to be hard. Look forward to others experience.
Sep 10, 2016
Parent Replies
Our son did vision therapy with Dr. Grisham in San Rafael. (risingstaroptometry.com). Dr. Grisham used to lead the binocular vision clinic at Cal.
The therapy did help a lot. They do a number of tests, and show you exactly what they want to accomplish, and then re-test to measure progress. Definitely worth doing, and doing now while he is younger.
The issues are not things that show up on a standard eye chart test, and things you would not necessarily notice, but can affect school performance.
My son started vision therapy at at the Berkeley clinic, but then quit. I found that they always ran late and the sessions were quite long since they were conducted by students who then had to refer to a senior person at the end. On the advice of my son's occupational therapist, I took him to Rising Star Optometry in San Rafael. They were much better. They also have a San Francisco office. My son was treated for convergence and tracking issues. We completed 14 sessions. The difference in his reading ability at the end of the sessions was phenomenal and made it worth the weekly drive to San Rafael.
Speaking as a retired teacher at Kensington Elementary School, I can tell you the UC Berkeley Binocular Vision Clinic was ALWAYS my first ally in helping children and parents deal with dyslexia/tracking problems. It's a real godsend because it works! They raise the children's self esteem because the kids know "it's not my fault" and there is something they can do at home to help themselves. I cannot recommend it any higher.
I have heard that the Binocular Clinic at UC Berkeley has been great for visual tracking issues. I would address this sooner rather then later.
Hi-
We have been to the UC Berkeley clinic for binocular vision and also Walnut Creek Optometry (Dr. Bach-Kim). Hands down we found Walnut Creek more helpful and less time consuming. UCB had a lot more in-person sessions where our daughter was clearly a patient for students to practice on. I felt maybe 25% of the time was useful and the rest practice for them.
Dr. Bach-Kim helped our first daughter enormously and our second (who we believe is dyslexic) also.
Good luck!