Eye alignment issues can have physical, academic, and social ramifications for children and adults alike. As an optometrist, educator, and lecturer, and residency-trained in binocular vision, Dr. Tanya Polonenko is well-equipped to determine the source of an eye alignment issue, and develop an appropriate course of treatment to strengthen and train the visual system.
One of the most common childhood eye conditions is the “lazy eye.” People may use this term as a descriptor when someone’s eyes do not move in sync or point in the same direction. However the name “lazy eye” is a little bit misleading, as poor eye alignment often has more to do with the brain than it does with the eye itself.
A lazy eye typically refers to 1 of 2 different eye conditions: strabismus and amblyopia.
Strabismus is an eye alignment condition that causes the eyes to point in different directions (turned eye). With strabismus, one eye is used to focus while the other eye points inward, outward, upward, or downward, or a combination of directions either intermittently or all of the time.
When the eyes are properly aligned, both eyes provide two parts of a single 3-dimensional image. However, when the eyes are not aligned, the brain struggles to merge the information from each eye into one image. Instead, they often produce two distinct-yet-overlapping images, which is called double vision. In order to see a single image, the brain will suppress or ignore the image from the lazy eye leading to the development of amblyopia.
Amblyopia develops when the brain starts “ignoring” one eye. The brain needs two halves of the same image to create 3-D vision. When the two halves do not line up properly (as in strabismus) or one half of the image is blurrier than the other (as in an uncorrected refractive error), the brain struggles to make sense of the information it receives.
Rather than attempt to merge two incompatible images together, the brain may start ignoring information from the turned or blurry eye. This in turn prevents that eye from fully developing and vision development is required with a systematic treatment approach.
While the appearance of strabismus may be noticeable, not every case of amblyopia is obvious.
There are often more subtle symptoms of strabismus and amblyopia, which include:
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