Dr. JR Rizzo Grand Rounds, Part 1

Dr. JR Rizzo is a physician scientist at Rusk Rehabilitation. He leads the Visuomotor Integration Laboratory where his team focuses on eye-hand coordination as it relates to acquired brain injury. Dr. Rizzo has been recognized as a Top 40 under 40 by Crain’s for his industry-leading innovation and dedication to transforming the lives of those with vision deficiencies worldwide. This is a two-part Grand Rounds presentation.  In Part One, Dr. Rizzo focuses on how hand-eye coordination is pervasive in rehabilitation. How do we actually build this hand-eye coordination? Every day, an individual experiences a quarter of a million eye movements. He asked how eye-hand coordination intersects with stroke. Patients who have had a stroke have to do a lot more work in conducting eye movements. It is exhausting to do a simple reach. A great deal of work is necessary to complete basic tasks. Hand-eye coordination is being impeded through interference. So good questions are what comes next and how do you actually deal with it? Currently, they are trying to understand the cognitive implications of what is happening. For example, what happens if we look at the way work is done by considering it as sequential steps, e.g., first look and then reach, first look and then reach. Improvement occurred. Instead of considering biofeedback of the limb, they began doing biofeedback of the eye.