Patients with balance issues of all types can benefit from therapy with Prime IVR’s virtual reality programs.

As the world’s population ages, more patients are diagnosed with vestibular disorders. These conditions increase the chances of the patient experiencing dizziness, with uncomfortable feelings of nausea and lightheadedness.

If you ever experience these symptoms and they subside, thank your vestibular system for returning your body to its normal state. This complex system, located behind the inner ear, sends sensory signals to your brain to regulate your sense of motion, spatial orientation and balancing. If it’s working effectively, the vestibular system will counteract developing symptoms like vertigo, dizziness, and falls.

If it’s not, Prime IVR can help. Bertec’s Prime IVR is an innovative therapeutic tool that incorporates virtual reality to assist patients in regaining their sense of balance. This rehabilitative training allows a patient’s brain to adapt to any abnormal signals from the vestibular system, as they progress through a series of exercises such as balance retraining, stretching and strengthening, vision stability training, walking exercises, and general practices to decrease dizziness.

Prime IVR: Virtual Reality in Physical Therapy

Until now, virtual reality headsets have traditionally been used for playing games and immersing themselves in the virtual world. But VR has emerged as one of the most reliable tools physical therapists can incorporate into their practice.

The VR headset used for physical therapy has a small screen, and often connects to a mobile phone, enabling users to enter a simulated reality. These headsets block out the physical world, so the wearer only sees what is on the screen. This virtual world moves in response to the patient’s movements, providing optimum exercise and training for real-world conditions.

Using VR for physical therapy is extremely effective, as it keeps the patient engaged in the rehab program. You will be more motivated, and enjoy the processes of the interactive exercise.

Prime IVR as a Therapeutic Tool

Patients who suffer from neurological conditions may have issues coordinating their limbs, making it difficult to reach and grab objects. It may also cause lower extremity impairments to make body balancing and walking difficult. With Prime IVR, patients can engage upper and lower extremity coordination and balance.

Equally important, any neurological disorder presenting difficulty with regular body movements can benefit from VR in physical therapy.

Vestibular Therapy

The vestibular system coordinates head movements and positioning with your eye movements. An impairment in the vestibular system may cause vertigo, resulting in serious balance issues and difficulty maintaining an upright position.

Using virtual reality headsets will help create an environment that challenges your visual system during vestibular rehab. Patients experience videos of roller coasters, optokinetic shapes, and cars zipping by while maintaining an upright balance.

These challenges will train your visual input and nerves, and strengthen the necessary connections between eye movements and vestibular organs.

Pediatric Conditions

Physical therapy is hard work, and can be extremely difficult for children unless presented as play. VR therapy is a novel way to incorporate play activities in rehab to enable the body’s functional movement. Technology is an innovative and effective way to keep kids engaged in rehab and correcting movement impairments.

Conditions that benefit from using VR include:

• Hypotonia
• Attention deficit disorder (ADD)
• Cerebral palsy
• Autism
• Developmental coordination disorder
• Developmental delay

Orthopedic Conditions

Patients who experience shoulder pain or difficulty reaching can enjoy, and benefit immensely from, VR therapy. Tiresome and frustrating repeated reaching exercises become a game with a visual goal.

VR physical therapy is also effective for patients with balance issues after knee surgery, or problems that occur from an ankle sprain. Users or physiotherapists will create engaging and challenging situations with VR to enable patients to stay focused during rehab. Additionally, VR rehab regimens offer new ways to use your body to improve movement and strength.

Common orthopedic conditions that can benefit from using VR include:

• Back pain, neck pain, and associated radiculopathies
• Ankle sprains
• After ankle, knee, or hip surgery
• Chronic pain management
• Shoulder pain and impingement

Any orthopedic injuries that create impairments to limit your functional mobility may benefit from using VR during rehab.

Prime IVR Features

The Bertec Prime IVR is a unique and effective VR-centered therapy technology that adds Immersive Virtual Reality (IVR) to improve clinical balance training and assessment. Its immersive environments are paired with a fixed double balance force plate to produce increased engagement, performance and results.

Prime IVR’s versatility as a therapeutic tool provides reliable training options to target and customize therapy for patients who suffer from a wide range of balance problems, dizziness, or motion sensitivity.

Qualifications to Use Prime IVR

Prime IVR can be used effectively by qualified physical therapists, vestibular therapists, physiotherapists, occupational therapists, and speech therapists to treat patients with coordination and balance issues.

At Brooks Rehabilitation center, we have more than 50 years of experience treating complex and challenging medical conditions with cases ranging from brain injury, stroke, neurological disorders, orthopedics, trauma, pain, and more. You can trust our services offered with precision and accuracy.

Equally important, we have world-class medical teams to serve patients with diligence and advanced solutions like dynamic posturography and immersive virtual reality. We have a collective knowledge of biomechanical testing and measurement to advance its application in mobility and balance.

From the first day, you will have access to a highly trained support team by your side. Contact us today to learn more about our services.