Wow Vision Therapy

Check out what this parent wrote about their child's experience in Vision Therapy! ⭐️

Our patient Lucy used to be severely behind in reading and learning largely due to problems with her eye coordination and visual processing. But, after completing vision therapy with us nearly 1 year ago, Lucy has made tremendous gains in her visual abilities and has begun to shine in reading and school performance. Last week, Lucy’s parents reached out to tell us that she continues to excel and is now consistently on the honor roll as well as made the top 5 of her class for reading, based on her NWEA test scores. Even better, she now loves to read! We are so proud of you Lucy!

Yesterday we had a new graduate from Wow Vision Therapy…Caleb S! Caleb made tons of progress in his visual abilities that has made a big difference in his reading, writing and learning. Here is his parents' Success Story written by his Mom.

Caleb's Success Story
Written by Mom- Stephanie

After just 3 weeks (6 sessions) at Wow Vision Therapy, we started to see improvements with Caleb’s reading and writing. His reversals of letters and numbers were significantly less and he wasn’t skipping lines or losing his place when reading anymore. His confidence grew and he was less resistant to reading! Another plus is he no longer complains about motion sickness in the car!

Happy Valentines Day from our Grand Rapids and St. Joe crew to you! ❤️

River has been working hard to use both eyes to be able to see 3-D. With all of his hard work, he was able to complete this challenging 3-D task!

Vision Therapy is not eye exercises. Vision Therapy is about developing the visual brain to properly coordinate and focus the eyes, process the visual information in the brain and integrate that with balance and movement automatically. In this WoW VT activity of the Week, Jonah is developing his eye focusing and eye teaming with his Vision Therapist's lens/prism and ball technique.

The Wow Team are passionate about teaching. To help continue to bring these advancements to others, our Doctors and Vision Therapists presented on this topic to the Annual Michigan Vision Therapy Study Group Educational Conference held on January 26-27, 2024, in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Click to learn more!

Accelerating Amblyopia Treatment - Faster and Better Than Ever Before - Wow Vision Therapy Accelerating Amblyopia Treatment – Faster and Better Than Ever Before is the title of the lecture presented by the Wow Team of Doctors and Vision Therapists at the Annual Michigan Vision Therapy Study Group Educational Conference held on January 26-27,...

Lauren is making so much progress learning to use her two eyes together as a team! AND she recently scored as an 18 year old on Visual Spatial Relationships! Wow, way to go, Lauren!

Help us congratulate our Patient of the Week, Eleanor, on her new ability to turn on and use her two eyes together, something she has been working very hard to be able to do! We are proud of you Eleanor, great work!

Our Wow Team of Doctors and Vision Therapists in both our St. Joseph and Grand Rapids locations, are excited to be lecturing tomorrow at the Annual Michigan Vision Therapy Study Group Educational Conference, held in Grand Rapids, MI! This year we will be presenting a 1 hour lecture to a large audience of doctors and vision therapists attending from around the US and Canada on the topic of: "Accelerating Amblyopia Treatment… Fixing Lazy Eye Faster and Better Than Ever Before".

Abel’s Success Story
By: Mom - Danielle

We came to Wow having tried a lot of traditional tutoring and other academic interventions to help Abel in reading. Nothing was making a dent in closing the gap for him, even after so much time and effort by him and the service providers he was seeing. When we had his annual IEP meeting at school, it seemed like his team had pretty much come to the conclusion that Abel was a kid who was bound to struggle with reading and I just couldn’t believe that he was out of options. One teacher there off- hand mentioned vision therapy as a possibility, and that’s how we found Wow.
The results over these past months have been so gratifying. The staff here has put words to things that we’ve never been able to describe, but have been a constant presence in Abel’s experience at school, doing homework, etc. Understanding how his visual skills, and not just his clarity of vision, make a difference in his reading has helped Abel give himself a second chance as a reader. He was willing to try again, and he is trying things on his own that he would never have even considered doing before vision therapy. He reads the questions to me off his nightly homework, instead of refusing to the point of tears until I read them to him. He writes the answers instead of dictating to me. He uses his book to check for spelling of certain words. And he is not avoiding school; he wants to be there.
Of all the things Wow Vision Therapy has given him, we are most thankful for that renewed confidence in himself, so that Abel can believe that he can be the student and reader he wants to be.

Help us congratulate our patient of the week, Emerson, who has completed the first round of the “see-sick” protocol to address his motion sickness, AND he has mastered how to tie his shoes all by himself! Congratulations, Emerson, we are proud of you!

Kaleb has made great progress in visual memory and learning to use both eyes together in his binocular activities! Keep up the good work, Kaleb!

SARAH'S SUCCESS STORY
By: Mom - Tamra

Sarah is much less frustrated with her schoolwork. Homework takes a lot less time, and Sarah is more confident in her ability to understand and remember what she has studied. With her glasses, she has said that the words written on the board aren’t blurry anymore and it’s easier to copy from the board. Sarah is also participating in class significantly more.

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By: Sarah

In the beginning, I thought, "Why do I need Vision Therapy? I can see fine.” But as I went on I started noticing how I could read faster, and I could get a subject of school done way faster than I could before. I am able to remember what I learned more easily than before. Once I got glasses I could see the board at school crystal clear! It was amazing!

Kennedy's reading ability has skyrocketed since her vision therapy journey began! She is now able to remember hard-sight words and read her age-level books. Congratulations Kennedy! Keep reaching for the stars!

HENRY'S SUCCESS STORY
By: Family

Henry is a 5-year-old little boy, and his teacher recommended us to come for a consultation. He was very interested in learning to read but really struggled to keep his place in books and with letter reversals. He also struggles really badly with car sickness, anything over 20 minutes in the car, and he had to have Dramamine.

We started our adventure with Krystal and Jessica in June 2023, twice a week. It has been amazing to watch his progress over the six months. Some days, it was a struggle, but he ultimately worked through it.

He liked doing his Vision Therapy activities, especially when the family joined in on it, and he could teach them. He is now reading and reading well; he doesn’t lose his place while reading, and his letter reversal has gotten better. Henry also doesn’t get car sick anymore!

We are thankful for Dr. Dan, Krystal, and Jessica and the time and effort they put into Henry and his therapy.

Vision therapy has helped Cade to see the ball more clearly when he plays baseball! Way to go, Cade!

ELAINA'S SUCCESS STORY
By: Hannah

Elaina has come such a long way since she began receiving treatment at Wow Vision Therapy. She had been struggling in so many areas of life, like reading, writing, and learning at an age-appropriate level. She was falling behind with class work and was visually hindered while doing different physical activities like balancing, catching a ball, etc.
After beginning her treatment, Elaina developed a good relationship with her therapist, Dr. Alicia. They worked weekly toward each goal, and after 35 sessions, she has acquired the skill, strength, and confidence needed to keep up with her peers.

We are all so grateful for the treatment and care Elaina was given by the team at Wow this past year!

Abel has been working hard at "Flip It," the Eye Bab reversal game, and scored 100% on his lowercase letters! (Here is Abel showing us a “before” picture of what “Flip It” looks like before starting the activity. Can you spot the backward letters?) Way to go, Abel!

Congratulations to Louisa for being Wow Vision’s patient of the week! Louisa has improved her laterality and figure-ground. So proud of all the hard work she is putting in!

Congratulations to Lacie, who now voluntarily picks up chapter books and reads them! This will help Lacie with her enjoyment of reading and with her schoolwork. Way to go, Lacie!

Happy Halloween from Wow Vision Therapy in St. Joseph!

Happy Halloween from Wow Vision Therapy in Grand Rapids!

MADELINE'S SUCCESS STORY
By: Madeline

I loved going to Vision Therapy.
It was the best!
I want to go back.
It helped my eyes get better at reading, writing, and focusing!

Henry is our patient of the week. He has been working hard in Vision Therapy and has learned he can do hard things without getting upset or giving up! Keep working hard, Henry!

ASHLYNN'S SUCCESS STORY
By: Ashlynn

My issues with nausea, dizziness/vertigo, motion sickness, and binocular vision dysfunction were a daily burden. Of the many tasks that were impacted by these issues, I can remember feeling hopeless that I would love the rest of my life the way I had been, and the symptoms would just continue to worsen.

I had been to specialist after specialist and eventually was directed to WOW for a consultation. Initially, I was scared. I felt like they would tell me that everything was “fine,” and I still would not have answers to why I felt so miserable.

To my surprise, that was not the case! I finally had answers, and we had a game plan to get me feeling back to normal. Going to therapy was interesting, fun, and extremely effective! Within just a couple of weeks of visits, I was already noticing a difference. Jessica helped me to understand what was happening with my eyes, why they malfunctioned, and what I could do to pull myself out of severe symptoms.

Today, I can drive (most of the time) long distances without feeling sick. I can cook and clean without becoming symptomatic and feeling like a failure. I can play with my kids and do things that I missed out on for so long.

Not every day is perfect, but I’ve got a jam-packed tool belt that I can use any and every day that I have symptoms. Most of the time, I can bring the symptoms down just as they’re about to start.

I’m so forever grateful for the help and support and the great people I’ve been blessed to interact with and get to know!

The time has come to reconsider occlusion therapy as the "best approach" for patients with Amblyopia.

When dealing with Amblyopia/Lazy Eye…latest research confirms VR in Vision Therapy is superior to patching Amblyopia, or Lazy Eye, is the most common cause of vision loss in children.

There is now published research, a systematic review, and meta-analysis, the highest form of research analyzing virtual reality in vision therapy for Amblyopia compared to occlusion therapy published in July 2023 through Elsevier. The researchers' results show, "Overall, virtual reality technology treatment significantly improved visual acuity by 0.07 log MAR (95% confidence interval [CI], -0.11 to -0.02; P < 0.001; I2 = 94.4%) compared with traditional patching therapy.”

Effects of virtual reality on the treatment of amblyopia in children: A systematic review and meta-analysis - PubMed Virtual reality technology treatment is effective in treating amblyopia in children. Virtual reality therapy is also entertaining and popular among children and can be applied to the treatment of amblyopia in children in the future.