September 17, 2021 - EyeClarity Podcast
Hey everybody, it’s Dr. Sam and I wanted to give you a glimpse into an evaluation I did making recommendations with a seven-year-old, autistic child. Now many of you don’t know, but I have specialized in working with children along the autism spectrum. We call it ADD on one end and autism on the other end. And I consult at a facility in Albuquerque called KidPower. You may have heard in some of my other podcasts, where I do trainings with the therapists, and I have extensive education and experience in working with these kids, I love these kids, they’re so awesome. And my kind of eye exam is really different than most eye doctors, we spend most of this time on the floor, believe it or not, because I’m really interested in their sensory-motor development. You know, one of my teachers used to say that when a child comes in for an evaluation, you’re evaluating the eyes and the vision, but you’re really evaluating the total child, the whole child. Enjoy the show. If you want more, sign up for my newsletter at:Â www.drsamberne.com.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
eye, called, primitive reflexes, reflex, focusing, hands, left, board, knees, legs, brain, crawling, test, glasses, vision, evaluation, pencil, put, child, position
Hello, everyone, it’s Dr. Sam, I’d like to welcome you to my EyeClarity podcast. This is a show that offers cutting-edge information on how to improve your vision and overall wellness through holistic methods. I so appreciate you spending part of your day with me. If you have questions, you can send them to hello@drsamberene.com. Now to the latest EyeClarity episode.
Hey everybody, it’s Dr. Sam and I wanted to give you a glimpse into an evaluation I did making recommendations with a seven year old, autistic child.
Now many of you don’t know, but I have specialize in working with children along the autism spectrum. We call it the add on one end and autism on the other end. And I consult at a facility in Albuquerque called kidpower. You may have heard in some of my other podcasts, where I do trainings with the therapists, and I have extensive education and experience in working with these kids, I love these kids, they’re so awesome. And my kind of eye exam is really different than most I doctors, we spend most of this time on the floor, believe it or not, because I’m really interested in their sensory motor development. You know, one of my teachers used to say that when a child comes in for an evaluation, you’re evaluating the eyes and the vision, but you’re really evaluating the total child, the whole child. And so we’re looking at it from a developmental perspective. We’re looking at it from a nutritional and biochemistry perspective. And we’re looking at it from Well, a lot of different facets beyond reading the eye chart, you know, most eye exams, you read the eye chart, they check you for eye health, they give you a pair of glasses, and you’re out the door and unfortunately in the pediatrics world, they put eyedrops in children’s eyes and it paralyzes the focusing muscles and then they end up giving these really whacked out prescriptions, which are too strong they’re too distorted because when you use eye drops, you are paralyzing the focusing muscles inside the eye. So in this boy, he came in with a very imbalanced prescription one eye was a lot more farsighted than the other in terms of the glasses, and he has a condition where his eyes are diverging so when I stray while the other eye wanders out, and then every once in a while he’ll alternate in the wandering eye will come in and fixate. So we call this an alternating exotropia or a divergent strabismus, and he’s had two eye muscle surgeries. And whenever you do eye muscle surgeries, you’re disconnecting the eyes from the brain, it is one of the worst surgeries you could ever do. And it really has a very low success rate. And it’s very eye centric, you know, let’s try to fix the, the strabismus by straightening the eyes through cutting the eye muscles doesn’t work, because it’s the brain that directs the eyes and the eye muscles. And that’s a learned and developed in an organic skill that’s based on our developmental motor patterns. And these patterns start in utero. And one of the body of work that I’ve studied is called the primitive survival reflexes. Now a lot of therapists know about this occupational therapists, I studied with two really fantastic guy, doctors from Scandinavia, and their community there, those eye doctors had been working with primitive reflex therapy for 20 years, you know, when I met them, and the primitive reflexes are governed by the brainstem, that’s the lower functioning part of the brain. There are early motor patterns that start in utero and one of the reasons why we all have these reflex patterns is they help us go into new situations and handle the stress and handle the trauma. Probably one of the main ones is when we come out of the birth canal, and that those two reflexes that show up are the Moro reflex, and the fear paralysis reflex. And any event. If these premium primitive reflexes don’t become integrated by about age three or four, they begin to affect our visual development, they can cause things like lazy eye, strabismus, myopia, and many other eye conditions. eye doctors don’t look at that, because they’re only looking at it from an eyeball optic standpoint, that’s the wrong way to go. You have to look at how the eyes and the brain and the body interface from a developmental perspective. So with this boy, he was referred by the facility kidpower and I did a vision evaluation on him and kind of blew his father away because I took his glasses off and immediately I could engage with him better, you know, the glasses were actually taking him further away from his visual processing. So because of the distortion of The lenses, I took them off. And then we did the eye exam, I had him read the eye chart with each I looked at his eye movements, and then we moved into a test called the van orden starts via star test, I wish I could do it on all of you. Because it’s such an amazing test. What it is, is you look into tele binocular, it’s like a telescope that you’re looking into
05:26
by an ocular scope, and you got two pencils, and you’re drawing some lines and getting the lines to meet in on the paper. And what this test shows is how the two eyes are projecting their focus on the world, it’s, it’s an amazing test, because it really shows you how your two eyes are focusing in the spatial world. And that is a much deeper, more of more accurate way of measuring a person’s vision. Remember, sight is reading the eye chart vision is a dynamic learned skill set of tracking, focusing visual coordination, eye hand coordination, and cognitive skills in the brain, that you get information through your eyes, have a memory, good visual memory and then have some output with it. Anyway, in this particular test, it showed that his two eyes were vertically splitting. And his right eye was over focusing and his left eye was under focusing. And that was never mind never tested or diagnosed from the other eye doctors because they were just looking at it from cosmetic structural point of view, then we’re looking at the function. Anyways, once we had that info, he definitely has some fine motor skill issues. So controlling the small muscles is really difficult. He has all his primitive reflexes, so they’re not integrated at all. And, and then we did something on a rotation board. So sometimes the vestibular system, which is the inner ear is a great testing tool, great portal into the relationship between the eyes and the inner ear, the inner ear is part of our balance mechanism, or orientation in space. And so what I have kids do is they get on this spinning board. And they have to get in different postural positions like sitting or lying down, or getting on their knees, and then they have to spin to the right and spin to the left with their eyes open, her eyes closed, and you could barely do it. I mean, he could not control his body very well, he didn’t know where he was in space. So that was good information that we need to do a lot of vestibular therapy, we also work a lot with what we call juggling scarves, I love this technique, we throw the scarves up in the air, and the child has to catch it. And they have to track it. And what I did with him is I had to give him an audio cue, look over here, and then he move his eyes there. And then I throw it in that direction. And then I would throw it, you know, look over on the left side, and I throw it there. So that was really fun for him. We did some what we call parquetry design, which is working with some blocks and designs. And by the end of the exam, I mean he was just so into it. He’s like, when can I come back. And you know, it was really great all around, and I changed his prescription I made both lenses the same, we reduced the prescription. And I think that’s going to work a lot better with him. And he needs a lot of sensory motor integration, primitive reflex therapy. He’s also got low muscle tone. So we’re gonna do some kind of biochemistry testing, to see if we can improve his dietary absorption, I feel there’s a couple of issues going on there. And some craniosacral therapy because of the traumas that he’s been through, especially with the two eyes surgeries, and even with the birth trauma. So this next part will be a recording of the actual exam. So you’ll hear me working with him. I didn’t do the whole exam. And so I hope you enjoy it. If you have any questions or comments, feel feel free to email me Hello at Dr. Sam Berne, calm, enjoy. The current prescription that he has, is correcting the right eye for a small amount of farsightedness and astigmatism, and the left eye is like four times as strong. And so it’s going to induce more separation between the eyes. Because you’re correcting one eye very differently than the other you’re never going to bring them together. So we’ll kind of put that into the mix as we go through the evaluation. First thing we’re going to have you do my friend is Come on over here. I want you to stand in the middle of this circle and stand next to me right there. Can you read any of those letters on the on the chart? Go ahead read for me start here with this. I think. Right right here, he’s good. Enough stands there again stands a point to it. So can you see that? Yeah.
10:21
What is he PTZLGPEC f, e, d, c, p.
10:46
All right. Now we’re going to try something. Can you cover the side with your hand? Now the other half the other on the other hand? Yeah. Now, with that I can you read the same row? No cheating. Keep your eye cover. Can you see any? Can you see the biggie? Yeah. Okay. Can you see anything else? Yeah. What can you see? Next? Oh, no cheating. If you cheat. We’re gonna put a patch over that I about there.
11:23
Okay.
11:25
Well, we does is fine.
11:26
Okay. Oh, t e, t. Okay, you can stop.
11:33
Alright, so why would you stand next to me? Hold on, stand right over here. Stand right here. And patient. Okay, I want you to do the same thing. I want you to cover your right eye. And look at your data. So you see how that is straight? Correct. Pretty straight? Pretty much. Yeah, yeah. Pretty much. Nobody look at your dad. Look at his Look at his eyes. Yeah, really focus on like you, me, buddy. Looking at? You don’t need to stand closer. Just look at me. Okay, right. There you go. All right. And now cover your other eye and uncover the first day. Now we get you down versus this one. There we go. Now look at the cover cover completely. There you go. Now look at me. Alright, good job. All right. So you can put your hand down. Alright, it’s good. Good. So when one of the eyes is straight, and one of the eyes is turned out, he’s basically using the eye that’s straight in the eye that’s turned out, he’s either going to create double vision, because his eyes are painted to different positions, or the brain is going to say, Oh, I’m going to just ignore the eye this term. That’s what I’m doing. That’s what he’s doing that. And both of those are genius moves. So no worries on that, I think Yeah. And he tends to like using his right eye a little more than he likes using his left eye. But there are times if he were to use his left eye, he may not be seeing quite as clearly. But he can see something out there. The problem comes in is he’s just relying on the right eye, primarily all the time. So the left eye starts to, you know, say, Hey, I’m checking out, I’m not going to work. And so one thing we want to do on an eye level is to try and create more stimulation in the left eye. And I’m not a big fan of doing a lot of patching. Did you try that? We did. Yeah, we actually got to the point. We were doing like eyedrops to kind of Yeah, that doesn’t work at all. No, it didn’t work out. Well. It didn’t doesn’t work. It’s really not it’s not a good thing. Almost. But there are ways there are ways that you can stimulate both eyes. However, we have to be clever about and we want again, buy in from limb to buy in, and he’s going to do this. So part of this is going to see if we can create a bargain. All right, my friend. Do you know how to draw? Yeah, you do. Okay, you’re gonna prove it to me. Come on over here. All right, come on, it’s time to do some delay. Let’s see me do some drawing. Okay. All right. So let’s, let’s try to standing maybe that might be We’ll see. All right. So I’m gonna give you a pencil on each hand here. You got one in this hand, and one in the other hand to hand. All right. Now, may I touch you, I just want to get you up here. There we go. You need to look into the scope. And you’re going to take this pencil and put it here and this pencil Pull it up here. They keep looking in the scope. And bring your pencils into the middle where they look like they touch together and let them go. Get them to get them to come together. Draw them into the middle, into the middle where you get them to touch into the middle this way. Yeah, looking here. Okay, we’re gonna try it again. Same thing, get up, get the touch. Get him to touch. Bring him into the middle. Come on. Get him to touch. Okay, you get to do it again. Give them the touch. Good job, man. Next, go the touch. Okay. Next. Get him to touch. The touch. Okay, keep going. Look in the scope. ofice Here we go. Okay, next. Good. love what you’re doing here?
16:14
Go.
16:17
Good. Okay, one more. Okay, you can drop your pencil and go back next year, dad. Thank you. Yeah. Good job. Okay, this is going to show us something. And it’s going to show us how his eyes and his hands are working together. So in this machine, if you were going to do it would look like this. There’s a space. Because you see it come together before you feel it coming together. And this is what your son is doing. So his right eye tends to be vertically higher. And his left eye is vertically lower. This is the right? Yes, you can see there’s a vertical displacement. And midline is not real clear. Where’s my visual midline? It’s somewhere but I’m not sure. And I got to feel my way to the answer. Because I’m not really seeing them come together. detail and focus are kind of hard for me. That’s kind of what he’s saying. And then finally, his lines are coming together a little better here on the right side than on the left side. So he he’s over, I wouldn’t say over focusing. But he’s focusing a little better with the right eye and a little less than the left eye. So ultimately, this is the kind of focus he’s got or this is the kind of focus he’s got going on. Okay. Okay. So he’s, he’s kind of separating it. And he sprays the focus out with the right. And he really sprays the focus out with the left. So there’s no way that you can correct that with glasses. That’s just basically all the glasses are doing is reinforcing that, especially if you’re using the eye chart. If you’re using eyedrops to, you know, yes, I just put the eye drops you’re doing is actually paralyzing the focusing muscles. So you can get a better look into the eye health in the retina. But it’s not a great way to prescribe because you’re going to over prescribe a lot, right? Yeah. All right. So have you ever heard of something called the primitive survival reflexes? I mean, I’ve heard some kind of a mention. Okay. So let’s see if I’ve got time. So primitive reflexes, they use them a lot of kidpower. I’ve used them a lot. These are movement patterns, that are basically the foundational motor patterns that support the motor sensory motor system. And what we’re going to do right now is we’re going to test the reflexes and see how many of them have not been integrated. Now, if they’re not integrated, then it affects the eyes developing because the motor patterns are not really understood. So hey, here’s what we’re gonna do. Alright, buddy. It’s temporary. Time for you to go work here. We want you to lie in your belly. Lie in your belly on the floor.
19:42
You can do it. Come on, lie in your belly. You can do it. Lie in your belly, your tummy, your neck, your back your tummy. So, rollover rollover.
19:54
rollover. Put your arms out in front of you. Get on your belly. Did he do any tummy time when he was young? Yes, he did. Okay, well,
20:05
wow. Okay, he needs to do more right now. All right, yeah, I want you to lift your arms in your head off the ground and your legs like you’re flying. Can you do that? Alright, so this is the tonic Labyrinth reflex, he definitely has not integrated, that was integrated, his legs would be straight, his arms would be straight, and he would just be in a position. And so this reflex is affecting his eye hand coordination. In developing. Okay. All right now, hold on, steady, get into a crawling position where he thinks crawling not not that he’s going to crawl the way he thinks the crawling position is don’t show him. Okay. Just see if you can get him into a crawling present. Like you’re going to crawl what is what is crawling look like for you? What does
20:50
it look like when you’re going to crawl show? Like if you like you were crawling down the hallway this morning? Because you thought it was funny. Since you’re crawling, you know, he can do it. I mean, he crawled he was he crawls regularly because he thinks it’s funny, but I don’t know. All right, so sure what the position I want them to get into, I want you to copy your Daddy, look at me. Like you crawl. Number two, get that position. So you got to do something different with your legs. Look at me. With me. You know, look at me, I know you’re fine, because you don’t want to do this. But we’re gonna make you do. It’s not going to work. If you refuse to do it. I’m not going to let you quit. Trying to look at me, not over here. Look at me. Not over here.
21:42
The hidden crop
21:45
that’s not crawling, and you know, and you’re just fighting with me. You don’t want to do this. to zero your hands and knees like that.
22:02
I don’t know, if you’re just not you just not want to do this. I need you to do it anyway. Can you do that for me? I’m gonna do that after you get through this. I know you just want to go home. What can you do this? Okay, let’s let’s take a pause. It’s okay. To take a pause.
22:27
So it’s okay. He gave me the answer. All right. So can you sit on this board and spin? Can you do that? Try that, throw that. Sit on it. And you sit on use your feet and spin yourself around. So this is called the CP overstimulation. Now using your feet using your feet, put your feet on the carpet with your feet on the carpet. And now game stuff around with your feet. There we go. Yeah, keep going. So vestibular stimulation, this is the inner ear is a great way to improve the vision because it’s getting the ears and the eyes to reconnect in the brain. Alright, go the other direction. Can you turn the other way. In fact, sometimes if he does a lot of the stimulator work, you actually might see the left and the right, be more equal. Awesome. Keep going
23:21
something he actually really liked to do when he was younger, we put him in like an office chair and he wants to spend money on
23:26
something called astronaut training. That is a very prescribed way of spinning. Alright, now close your eyes and go in the first direction. So now you’re going to keep your eyes closed, and see if you can spin. So now we’re taking the eyes out of the equation and just as hears are going the other direction. The other direction the other way. Other way, close your eyes and go the other way. To get some understanding left and right a little better. Spatial visions about space understanding space has very little to do with reading the chart. Okay, that’s really good. All right, here’s another way can you put your knees on the board and use your hands this time to spin? Try try that. Put your knees on the board to turn over so your knees are on where you got to lift up your butt. That’s sorry, lift up your butt. So your knee you’re sitting on your knees. So I’m sitting on my legs trying to do that. Can you do that? No. All right, we want to show
24:30
like pushing knees on. You’d have to stand up and turn around so you can do this. Here we go. Turn around, but your knees protruding poor. Yeah. Put your knees. That’s your foot. That’s your foot, your knees, your knees on the floor. Yeah,
24:52
let’s see you’re touching your knees. You’re getting closer but your knee needs to go on the floor. There we go. Get there. Keep going. What up youtube? There we go. All right. Good. Can I have your hands?
25:08
For you over here?
25:10
Okay, okay, now his hands are going to be too. There we go. All right, me on board. Good for you guys. Okay, now he’s gonna put his hands on the carpet, hands on the carpet. And now Can he turn turn around with your hands, use your hands to move the board. Keep going, you’re doing good man. Go all the way around that right hand towards the left hand. So you want to turn. So you have to pick this hand up and move it on look on the carpet. Yeah. So use your hands on the carpet. That’s the board and use your hands. Try and go towards your dad
26:00
towards your dad and say do it and keep using your hands churn. probably worth mentioning. We got some bone muscle tone and autism and pretty good balance issues going to so that’s okay. That’s okay. Growing edge for him. This is good man Kiko. So you turn on the board. Yep. Just like that. And I keep going around the circle, keep going.
26:33
With your hands, with your hands. moving your hands there. That’s how you do it. Keep doing that.
26:44
Keep doing it.
26:46
This is building a lot of great pathway opening in the brain by him, then this is the kind of things he really needs to do. And we don’t have to focus so much on the eyes right now. Because we’re working through the body and the brain to give his eyes a certain pathway to follow. So instead of starting with the eyes and going away, we’re walking through the body operate. Can you go the other way now? All right, you’re doing it the other way. Just one more time.
27:18
Yep, one more time around. So all the way around. See what you’re doing is you don’t need to move your knees. need to move your hands.
27:27
There we go. This is really good for him. Yeah. So there’s a term we use called neuroplasticity. And the brain has neuroplasticity for everybody. Doesn’t matter where they started from your legs. Keep your knees on the board. Okay? Don’t move to this. Don’t lose this. Just turn your hands. That’s right. Exactly. Exactly. You got to do. That’s how you do it. Okay. And then go. Okay, that’s good. Okay, you can take a break. All right. Good job, man. You want to do one more? You want to? You’ve had enough. Okay, so why in your belly on the board, put your belly. Okay. Here’s Tony on the board. hands, your chest, your belly hands here. You’re gonna use your hands. So straighten your legs out. There we go. Straighten your legs. Yeah, now use your hands to push your round. That’s right. Good. Thank you more using your legs. But I think we could do it. It’s okay. To go the other direction. All right. The other way. Other way? Can you go the other way another way. So one of the things also that I would really start accentuating is having a lead with the left side of his body. And that will start awaken the left eye. Because he’s very right. goes to the right, but he’s not really aware of the left the keynote. Yeah. And so again, we’re going to use the body and the movement to awaken the eye. Okay, okay, it’s another strategy. And what can you keep going all the way around or you start to move your hands and your legs and go all the way, all the way? Yep, now you have to move your legs because you get what you could do is lift him and move him more forward so more of his hips are on the board. So we’re going to try this. So give us give us hips more on the board. So there’s hands further and lift him up. He’s going more forward. There we go. There we go. All right. Now use your hands
29:55
and use your hands and turn to me through your hands. roomie, yeah, like that. Come on. Can you turn, turn, turn
30:11
to pick us up.
30:13
James turned to me. gotta pick your legs up because your knees are keeping you from turning. Oh, that’s not your legs. That’s your stomach. You got to pick your legs up like this.
Thank you for listening. I hope you learned something from the EyeClarity podcast show today. If you enjoyed the episode, make sure to subscribe on iTunes or Spotify and leave a review. See you here next time.
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