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Can brain injury effect a person's balance??
Balance or equilibrium difficulties commonly result from brain injury. They are associated with vision and hearing (the oculovestibulo mechanism). Post-trauma vision syndrome frequently includes a condition called midline shift syndrome. The midline shift syndrome results in a patient experiencing a constant sense of disequilibrium, difficulty with maintenance of balance, an inappropriate posture and weight distribution on the balls of the feet, and inappropriate gait, combined with a directional drift. Such patients also often express that they perceive their world in a strange way, in that the horizon may be tilted, walls may be tilted or compressing in upon them.
These symptoms of midline shift syndrome are effectively addressed in most cases with a concept referred to as yoked prism reorientation. It must not be concluded that this is a cure for this problem. It is an immediate amelioration of the symptoms in most cases that are correctly diagnosed as midline shift damage. This requires a differential diagnosis eliminating damage to the vestibular mechanism. The most common imbalance experience following head injury is oculo motor decompensation and binocular visual-motor-perceptual imbalance decompensation resulting in midline shift syndrome. This case is symptomatically treated with yoked prism reorientation therapy.