Acquired Brain Injury (ABI)/concussion is an all-encompassing/umbrella term for damage to the brain that occurs after birth. Typically this damage is sudden, non-progressive, non-degenerative, and leads to abnormalities in neurological processing. These neurological changes can adversely affect the way a person functions in their activities of daily living, i.e., thought process, emotional behavior, speech ability, and physical changes such as impaired motor function, problems with a person’s visual system including, but not limited to:
An ABI can be from an external traumatic injury (where the brain encountered physical trauma from such incidents as a motor vehicle or bicycle accident, a fall, an assault, contact sports, or neuro-surgery, etc.) or it can be from an internal cause (a stroke, an aneurysm, a brain tumor, a viral infection or inflammation such as meningitis, a vestibular dysfunction such as Ménière’s disease, or any post-surgical complications leading to an anoxic or hypoxic event in the brain).
- Eye tracking problems
- Eye teaming problems
- Eye focusing problems
- Visual field problems
- Visual information processing problems
An ABI can be from an external traumatic injury (where the brain encountered physical trauma from such incidents as a motor vehicle or bicycle accident, a fall, an assault, contact sports, or neuro-surgery, etc.) or it can be from an internal cause (a stroke, an aneurysm, a brain tumor, a viral infection or inflammation such as meningitis, a vestibular dysfunction such as Ménière’s disease, or any post-surgical complications leading to an anoxic or hypoxic event in the brain).
Some of this information was produced by the College of Optometrists in Vision Development, which board certifies qualified optometric physicians in vision therapy. www.covd.org.