From War Injured to the Elderly, Brain Injuries Are on the Rise for Vision Rehabilitation Practitioners (Report‪)‬

Serving the growing population of adults with brain injury and related visual impairments provides our field with unprecedented challenges, but also new opportunities for growth, professional expansion, and collaboration with professionals from a wide range of rehabilitative services. Whether they are returning service members from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; adults injured in motor vehicle accidents, falls, or other trauma; or survivors of stroke or other brain injury, these presenting patients are forcing us to rethink some of our rehabilitation strategies and adapt our methods to meet their complex needs. Rehabilitation training, particularly traditional methods of teaching the special skills needed by people who are visually impaired (that is, who are blind or have low vision), often relies on the use of cognitive processes such as attention, memory, and auditory processing. Although each brain injury is unique and multifaceted in its effect on rehabilitation learning, the performance of these skills may be the most challenging to a person with a brain injury (Lew, 2005). Nevertheless, a growing body of research and collaborative teamwork with other professionals treating brain injury give us many tools for working with an individual with such an injury. The future is exciting for those of us who work in blind or vision rehabilitation, and we all have a chance to make a positive impact on a substantial population. CALLING ALL SERVICE PROVIDERS