The Concussion Blog

More and more information coming in is dealing with the recovery/therapy for the 10-15% of those concussion patients that have symptoms linger longer than 7-10 days.  Just like the initial management of concussions none of it is tried and tested in the scientific world; however results are positive with many things.  For example we have discussed “Wiihabilitation”, vestibular training, and immediate activity (Buffalo Protocol); thanks to the inbox we can examine a tool for vision enhancement and visual therapy.

As with most products that send me email I ask they present in a story, something we can understand and identify.  After they send the email I then read and provide feedback if changes are needed to be on the blog; as well as follow up with their product.  Per my usual stance I am not endorsing this product, merely providing more information for readers that are looking for help/ideas.  You can think of it as screening products.

Without further ado here is the information about Dynavision;

Cincinnati, OH (May 30, 2012)—Jen Umberg never saw it coming. It was May 23, 2011, during a terrible storm in Cincinnati. Winds were gusting and she was trying to get inside. But before she could, she was hit in the head by her neighbor’s hose box that flew from next door.  Momentarily knocked unconscious and 4 1Ž2 feet from where she was, all she could think about was, what just happened?

“I felt the most intense pain of my life,” Umberg remembers, “I thought I had been shot by a bullet.”

Umberg was left with a concussion at the same time she was rehabbing from foot surgery a few weeks prior.  Two months after her accident, Jon Divine MD, her doctor and the Head Team Physician for The University of Cincinnati Bearcats, directed her to begin rehab at UC with their athletes using the Dynavision D2.  As part of her neurological evaluation, Joe Clark PhD used Dynavision to measure and train/retrain visual, cognitive and peripheral deficits.

“He developed a plan for a Novacare athletic trainer to use with me,” Umberg said, “ When my progress plateaued and obviously vision related, he began to work with me two times a week on the D2 himself (that was in late January or early February).” The focused Dynavision™ and vision training helped get her past that plateau. 

“The feelings it conjures up when you hear a story like this and meet the actual person,” said Dynavision CEO Phil Jones, “Mostly we hear cases like these from the therapists that work with these patients, but to be part of the movement to help and have such stunning results is very gratifying. It’s a form of holistic healing that is working. And Jen is living proof.  From despair to optimism; now that’s a leap that’s worth taking.”

Umberg was so moved by Dr. Clark and his staff at UC, that she decided to make a life change from political consultant to patient advocate, helping the sports, medical and other personnel at the University of Cincinnati to teach others about the benefit of Dynavision™ and D2.

“I am not planning to return to politics as I have become passionate about working with concussion patients as an advocate and training on the D2 which is why I became an Approved Dynavision™  Trainer,” Umberg said.

“Jen’s story is another example of the breadth of the applications of the D2 in the Neuro-care field,” Jones said, “I don’t think the brain cares whether it is injured from flying debris or a helmet to helmet hit.  If you get hit the wrong way, the brain just knows that it is injured. The fact that the D2 is in over 40 VA hospitals and hundreds of Neuro Care units where it is used in traumatic brain injury (TBI) treatment for the returning veterans, shows that it is a vital and standard piece of equipment used in monitoring, treatment, return to play/work  and recovery for this market. It was serving the TBI market long before medicine and sports connected to realize that concussion is a form of TBI. Now, all of a sudden it makes so much sense.”

As it is laid out on Dynavision’s website at www.Dynavisiond2.com, The unique and important features of the Dynavision™ to rehabilitation are its ability to challenge the peripheral visual system while at the same time, applying cognitive challenges combined with gross physical movement.  

Thanks to the D2, there is a strong connection between improvements in scanning skills for those who have “Visual Field Deficit Post Stroke”. The Dynavision is ideal because it allows for this training on a large visual field.

Peripheral visual attention is needed to protect an individual from potential dangers in the environment, and speed in searching the peripheral visual field is critical to safety in environments involving rapid visual changes.”

Originally, in its application of Return to Play the Dynavision worked because it’s such a great tool for measurement, evaluation and self/evaluation.  It was a great indicator of how we were doing in our daily activities when we used the D2. The scores were always correlated with how you were feeling at that time, be it stressed, tired, ready, fired up or whatever , that we knew it could closely monitor a person’s functional levels at any level of consciousness, be it normal, or concussed (TBI’d). And when the anecdotal cases started rolling in that was exciting. But now that we have started to see more and more people with long-term issues that are actually healing, it simply cannot be ignored!