Does eye exercises along with physical training helps in achieving better sports performance? Effect of vision therapy on basketball players

Abstract

Aims: To determine the prevalence of binocular vision anomalies and effect of vision therapy on performance of basketball players Settings and Design: Prospective interventional study Methods and Material: Total 32 basketball players of the Bharati Vidyapeeth University, Pune, with the mean age of 20.47±1.883 year, were assessed. The examinations included detailed history taking, Visual acuity, Refraction, Slit lamp evaluation and detail orthoptic evaluation. Out of 32 players 21 players were detected with non-strabismic binocular vision anomalies that had undergone 4 weeks of home therapy and 4 weeks of office therapy. Vision therapy included accommodative therapy, convergence therapy, eye hand coordination and body eye coordination exercises, reaction time, saccades. Sports performance was judged objectively by Johnson Basketball test and subjectively by questionnaire both pre and post therapy for comparison. Detail orthoptic evaluation was performed after 4 weeks and 8 weeks of vision therapy. Statistical analysis used: Statistical analysis was done using SPSS version 20.0 software. Results: Out of 32 players 25 were males (78.1%) and 7 females (21.9%).Convergence insufficiency was the most Prevalent anomaly of binocular vision (25%) followed by convergence excess (15.6%), divergence insufficiency (15.6%) and accommodative insufficiency (9.4%).Statistically significant improvement in the sports performance (