Harmony Vision Behavioural Optometrists

Category Archives for Vision Therapy

Can Strokes Cause Binocular Vision Dysfunction (BVD)?

A stroke can affect far more than visual clarity. In this article, I explain how a stroke can disrupt the way the eyes move, align and work together, potentially leading to binocular vision dysfunction (BVD).

When Vision Doesn’t Bounce Back After Concussion

Concussion affects not only thinking and balance but also the way the eyes and brain work together. Vision problems are among the most common reasons people struggle to return to learning, work, or sport after a head injury — yet they often go unrecognised.

After a concussion, most people expect that rest and time will help everything settle. But sometimes, even after the headaches ease and concentration improves, reading or focusing up close still feels hard. Words might blur or shift, or eyes may ache when using screens.

These lingering issues are often overlooked, yet they can have a major impact on school, work, and everyday comfort. One of the most common reasons for this is a vision condition known as convergence insufficiency — where the eyes struggle to work together, especially at near distances.

Person experiencing difficulty reading after concussion, representing post-concussion vision problems such as convergence insufficiency.

Understanding What Your Eyes Are Going Through

After a concussion, the brain and eyes can lose their smooth coordination. Even small changes in the way your eyes focus, move, or align can create symptoms such as double vision, blurred print, headaches, or fatigue.

The visual system relies on precise timing between the eyes and brain. After concussion, the pathways controlling eye movements and focus can become disrupted. Even a small mismatch can cause blurred or double vision, making reading, driving, or using screens uncomfortable.

For children and adults, these issues can make learning or returning to normal activities much harder. Many people assume it’s just part of post-concussion recovery — but persistent visual symptoms can point to an underlying binocular vision issue.

At Harmony Vision on the Gold Coast, our optometrists have seen how these visual difficulties can affect daily life. It’s one of the reasons we opened our practice more than twenty years ago — to help people whose vision affects how they perform and feel each day.

To understand more about how the eyes work together, visit our Binocular Vision Dysfunction page.

What the Latest Study in British Journal of Sports Medicine Found

A new study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine explored concussion-related convergence insufficiency (CON-CI) — a persistent vision problem that can appear weeks after injury.

The researchers found that:

Recovery from CON-CI was rare without targeted management.
Treatment was provided between four weeks and six months after injury; delaying treatment did not change outcomes, but did prolong discomfort.
With structured vision-based care, many participants experienced improvement in both signs and symptoms over a few months.

This research underscores how important it is to assess visual function as part of post-concussion care, rather than assuming all symptoms will resolve on their own.

If you’d like to read more about evidence-based approaches for improving visual function, explore our Vision Therapy overview.

Supporting Recovery and Reducing Frustration

For many people, the first step toward recovery is simply recognising that vision plays a role. Good lighting, scheduled breaks from near work, and limiting screen glare can help reduce eye strain. Adjusting text size, using physical books instead of backlit screens, and pacing return-to-learn or return-to-work activities can also make a difference.
However, if symptoms persist beyond a few weeks, a targeted visual assessment can identify whether further support is needed. This doesn’t always mean complex therapy — sometimes it begins with understanding how your vision is functioning and what daily adjustments can reduce strain.
Everyone’s concussion recovery is different, and the goal is always comfort, clarity, and confidence in everyday visual tasks.

Helping People Return to Learning, Work and Life

If you or someone you know continues to struggle with reading, eye strain, or headaches weeks after a concussion, it’s worth mentioning this to your optometrist or healthcare provider. A comprehensive visual function assessment can help determine whether the eyes are part of the problem — and guide the next steps toward recovery.

Early recognition makes a difference. Addressing visual function helps people rebuild confidence, reduce fatigue, and return to study, work, and everyday activities feeling more like themselves again.

Harmony Vision Optometry has served the Gold Coast community for more than 20 years, helping families understand how vision affects learning, comfort, and performance. Our optometrists provide comprehensive assessments that look beyond eyesight to how the eyes and brain work together in everyday life.

https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/early/2025/09/30/bjsports-2025-109807

Behavioural Optometry Q&A

Q What is Behavioural Optometry?

A. Behavioural Optometry is practiced by qualified optometrists, who have an interest in how the eyes work in conjunction with the whole body ie how visual behaviour interacts with everything we do.

Some of the principles behind this approach are drawn from
the fields of neuroscience, cognition and how the brain learns. Vision is the
least well developed sense at birth, yet it rapidly evolves to become the
dominant processing sense by the time a child starts school. Although we are
born with eyes, vision is a learned skill requiring very precise motor control
and brain power. Therefore, vision is a learned behaviour or set of skills –
hence the name Behavioural Optometry

Q. How is Behavioural Optometry different?

A. Traditionally, health problems are identified by looking at each body part or function separately. However, the brain and body do not function this way. Now, in the year 2020, science has proven this over and over. Instead, the brain will utilise the entire brain and body in a complex, unified way. Vision is a major part of this complexity and simply looking at a person’s eyes will limit the ability to understand a person’s visual process.

At Harmony Vision, our optometrists are interested in testing the visual skills that are important to a person’s learning, work and life. If you are a child, or a student, working or retired, your visual demands may be individual to you. This means an eye check should be tailored to YOU.

Q. Why did the teacher recommend a Behavioural Optometrist?

A. Teachers witness first-hand the impact that undetected vision problems have in a classroom. Some children will still have vision problems despite passing a school sight screening because the screenings are limited in which parts of vision are checked. Therefore, teachers may ask for a comprehensive visual evaluation to assess all of the important aspects of vision for the classroom when they notice a child struggling in certain ways.

The entire visual system is much more complex that just
sight or “20/20”. There are many aspects of a child’s vision that allows them
to concentrate, maintain attention on close tasks such as books and screens,
visually recall or remember things and process visual information. The fine
muscle control of the eyes must be tested to ensure that the eyes focus well
from the board to book, team together to keep words from jumbling together and
track well across the page for fluent reading.

For a comprehensive vision evaluation that tests critical
visual skills for learning and studying, phone 5520 5900 or book online today.

Q What is Behavioural Optometry?
A. Behavioural Optometry is practiced by qualified optometrists, who have an interest in how the eyes work in conjunction with the whole body ie how visual behaviour interacts with everything we do. Some of the principles behind this approach are drawn from the fields of neuroscience, cognition and how the brain learns.

Children’s Vision – Time To Chat To Your Teacher

The modern classroom asks a lot from a child’s eyes.

A child’s ability to learn is intimately related to their vision. At school, 80% percent of what your child will learn is obtained visually. Think about it, most of their learning happens in front of a whiteboard, computer or book. How the brain and eyes work together has a tremendous impact on the learning process.

Alice Forsyth Optometrist At Harmony Vision

At Harmony Vision Care we are fortunate to have a team of leading optometrists who are passionate about helping our clients realise their best performance through better vision. One such member is Alice Forsyth, a behavioural optometrist who studied Optometry at UNSW and joined the Harmony Vision Care team in 2014.

In April, Alice traveled to Sydney to attend the 8th International Congress in Behavioural Optometry, along with the rest of the Harmony Vision team. Staying up to date with research and clinical practice is important to Alice, so when not cooking, spending time with her family or enjoying music, Alice enjoys reading and pursuing knowledge. To this end, she is currently studying for her Fellowship, which is a long road, and lots of hours of study!

We recently sat down with Alice for a quick question and answer session to find out why she’s so passionate about behavioural optometry and to help you get to know her a little better.

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