Vision and Neural Engineering Laboratory

Convergence insufficiency (CI) is a prevalent binocular vision disorder that disrupts coordination of the eyes as they turn inward to focus on a near object. Symptoms, which include double and blurred vision, eyestrain and headaches during reading or other close work, negatively impact activities of daily living and can significantly impair a child’s ability to focus and learn, for example. CI is present in about five percent of the population; just over a quarter of these patients do not improve even with validated therapy. While office-based therapy is effective in about 75 percent of patients with CI, home-based therapies are no more effective than a placebo. Our NIH-funded project studies two potential mechanisms that may cause CI that we believe could be improved through therapy. This knowledge could lead to targeted therapeutic interventions, improved treatment success rates, reduction in the time to remediation and reduced healthcare costs. The laboratory is also funded by a life-science focused venture capital fund and through an IEEE EPICS grant to develop a virtual reality-game therapy device with NJIT’s Computer Gaming Program, Salus University and The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia.