Validity of the VERA visual skills screening

Area of Science:

• Ophthalmology
• Pediatric Optometry
• Educational Psychology

Background:

• Traditional school vision screenings primarily assess visual acuity.
• There's a recognized need for comprehensive tools to identify learning-related vision issues.
• Visual skill deficits frequently remain undiagnosed in school-aged children.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the efficacy of the Visual Efficiency RAting (VERA) software in screening for learning-related vision problems.
• To compare VERA's visual skills screening results with a standard optometric assessment.
• To determine VERA's ability to detect binocular, accommodative, and ocular motor skills deficits.

Main Methods:

• 154 children in grades 3-5 participated in the study.
• Participants underwent the VERA visual skills screening.
• Evaluations included a clinical battery of visual skills tests, symptom surveys, and reading assessments.

Main Results:

• VERA demonstrated 45% sensitivity and 83% specificity for detecting visual skills problems.
• When incorporating symptom, behavioral, and reading data, VERA's sensitivity rose to 64% and specificity to 100% in a subset of children.
• These findings suggest VERA's improved accuracy with additional contextual information.

Conclusions:

• VERA exhibits promising sensitivity and high specificity for identifying visual skill problems in school settings.
• The VERA screening tool offers a practical solution for detecting vision issues that impact learning.
• VERA can be considered an effective method for in-school vision screening, addressing a gap in current practices.