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Visual Consequences of Traumatic Brain Injuries
Sierra Chase, OTS; Savnit Gill, OTS; Rachel Kinsey, OTS; & Blair McLarin, OTS
Clinical Question
The research question is
“what IADL areas are
impacted due to visual
impairments from a
concussion?”
Introduction
Research is currently showing that
vision impairments are becoming
more recognized following a TBI.
Vision is essential to almost every
occupation that is performed. The
purpose of this study is to identify
common types of visual impairments
athletes face following a concussion
or multiple concussions and the daily
occupations that have been affected.
In order to increase understanding,
we will look at the changes in IADLs
in athletes who play high-contact
sports and have sustained a
concussion or multiple concussions.
The two hypotheses are:
● Athletes who experience
concussions have associated visual
deficits
● Athletes with concussions
experience difficulties with IADLs
Literview Review
There are five types of traumatic
brain injuries, concussions being the
most mild. TBIs can range in severity
leading to different visual
consequences that present differently
in each individual.The most common
visual consequences found in TBIs
include accommodative dysfunction,
convergence insufficiency, visual
field loss, followed by visual acuity
deficits (Merezhinskaya et al., 2019).
These visual consequences lead to
limited occupational performance
during reading, driving, and money
management. Lastly, the most
common interventions used by OTs
for these visual consequences include
optical devices, compensatory
strategies, and neuroplasticity-based
training (Blanchard et al., 2016)
Methodology
● Used a quantitative research design
● Survey created by researchers
● Population: high school and
college athletes who sustained a
concussion
● Surveys were sent to athletic
directors who distributed them to
their players
● Data was analyzed using Excel
Major Findings
One of our major findings is that both of
our hypotheses were proven. Our first
hypothesis was that athletes who
experience concussions have associated
visual deficits. From our results, we can
confirm that 82% of the individuals who
have incurred a concussion also have
associated visual deficits. We
discovered that 58% of our participants
who incurred a concussion were
sensitive to light specifically. Our second
hypothesis is that athletes with
concussions experience difficulties with
IADLs. Our survey results also
confirmed this to be true. According to
our results, 82% of athletes who incurred
a concussion also have difficulties with
some IADLs. 68% of our participants
checked that they had difficulties using
their cell phones.
Table 1. Activities that participants experiened difficulty in
post-concussion
R
Discussion
Looking back at this experience and
our survey we would have changed a
few things. The first thing we would
have done is added a question where
the participants were able to distinguish
which sport they received their
concussion in. This would have given
us the opportunity to determine if they
received more or less concussions in a
particular sport if they played multiple.
The second issue we had was a miss
marked question. Question 8 stated,
“Check any/all of the following visual
deficits you experienced after your
concussion(s).” However the survey
only allowed them to choose one
answer. The participants weren’t able to
tell us all of the visual deficits they are
experiencing as a result of their
concussions. Knowing this information
would have given us more to go off of
when determining our data.
References
● Blanchard, S., Chang, W., Heronema, A., Ramcharan,
D., Stanton, K., & Stollber, J. (2016). Common
occupational therapy vision rehabilitation
interventions for impaired and low vision associated
with brain injury. Optometry & Visual Performance,
4(5), 265-274.
● Merezhinskaya, N., Mallia, R., Park,D., Bryden,D.,
Mathur,K., & Barket, F. (2019). Visual deficits and
dysfunctions associated with traumatic brain injury: A
systematic review and meta-analysis. Optometry and
Vision Science, 96(8), 542-555.
https://doi.org/10.1097/OPX.0000000000001407