- Following 488
- Followers 25.4K
- Engagement 3.19%
- Avg likes 951
- Avg comments 21
About Vital Brain Institute
Vital Brain Institute (@vitalbraininstitute) is a Medical & health creator on Instagram, also filed under Healthcare. The account has 25,373 followers and 168 published posts. Recent posts average 951 likes and 21 comments, an engagement rate of 3.19%.
With 25.4K followers, Vital Brain Institute is a micro creator by the common 10,000 to 100,000 definition. Set against 488 accounts followed, the audience works out to about 52 followers per account Vital Brain Institute follows. Vital Brain Institute is set up as an Instagram business account. Flinque files Vital Brain Institute under Medical & health, with Healthcare as a secondary category.
The Instagram bio for Vital Brain Institute runs to 11 words across 3 lines. The latest activity Flinque has on record for Vital Brain Institute dates from March 2026.
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168 Posts
All 10 recent posts Flinque holds for Vital Brain Institute are videos. 168 published posts give Vital Brain Institute a moderate archive on Instagram. Against the audience, that is roughly 151 followers for each post published. Vital Brain Institute also keeps 1 story highlight on the profile. All 10 carry captions, averaging 311 words each. The captions are written mainly in English. Words that recur across them include primitive, still, should, child and active. The captions tag #autismo, #adhd, #primitivereflexes, #autism and #developmentaldelays.
By around 12 months, as that pathway matures, the Babinski should integrate. The toes should now curl downward when the sole is stimulated, which is the adult response. That shift tells us higher brain control has come online and the foot is ready for a real heel to toe gait pattern.
When the Babinski stays active past 12 months, you start to see it show up in how the child walks. The most common presentation I see in my office is persistent tiptoe walking. The child cannot organize a proper heel strike because the foot is still stuck in a primitive extensor pattern. The toes want to grip and extend, the heel avoids the ground, and the whole gait cycle gets thrown off. Over time this affects balance, postural tone, ankle and hip mechanics, vestibular integration, and often speech and attention too, because the same neurological immaturity that holds the foot back is holding the brainstem and cortex back as well.
A retained Babinski is never just a foot issue. It is a window into how the brain is developing.
#primitivereflexes #primitivereflexintegration #tiptoewalking #autism #autismo
When I evaluated them, both had a positive Spinal Galant reflex, which is what you are seeing in this video.
The Spinal Galant is a reflex every baby is born with. It develops in utero, and it helps the baby move through the birth canal. It should be fully integrated by 9 months of age.
When it stays active past that point, the lower back becomes sensitive to touch and pressure. Anything brushing that area sets the reflex off. The waistband of a shirt. The back of a chair at the dinner table. The edge of a school desk pressing into their lower back while they are trying to focus. Every brush against that spot sends a signal through the nervous system that the body has to answer, and the only way it knows how to answer is to move. So the child fidgets. They shift. They get up. It looks like they cannot sit still, and they genuinely cannot, because their own nervous system will not let them.
What makes these two worth showing side by side is the 9 years between them. At 3 it looks like a busy toddler. At 12 it looks like a kid who cannot focus through dinner or sit through class. Same reflex, same trigger, just one of them carrying it almost a decade longer.
Both sets of parents had been told the same thing, that this was behavior, that one was just a busy toddler and the other was just hyperactive. What they actually had was a primitive reflex that should have integrated when they were babies and never did. We are now working through the integration process with both of them.
#primitivereflexes #adhd #autism #autismo #developmentaldelays
But speech is not where development starts. It is one of the last things to come online. The brain develops from the bottom up. The brainstem and the reflexes from the first year of life have to develop and integrate. The vestibular system and the cerebellum have to give the child a stable, regulated body and good postural control. Only once those lower levels have developed does the cortex have the stability it needs to bring the language centers fully online.
Speech lives in the higher centers of the cortex, and they depend on everything underneath them being in place first. So when a child has retained primitive reflexes, poor postural control, or an underdeveloped vestibular and cerebellar system, those language centers cannot get efficient access to the speech centers, because the lower levels of the brain are still using up resources just to keep the body regulated.
This is why so many late talkers I evaluate are also the child who skipped crawling, still seems unsteady on their feet, cannot sit still, or has had a hard time with chewing and feeding. Parents are told these are separate problems. They are not. They are the lower levels of the nervous system that haven’t developed fully.
#primitivereflexes #developmentaldelays #speechdelay #autism #autismo
We are all born with the Moro reflex. It is a baby’s earliest protective mechanism. When a newborn senses something that could be a threat, a loud noise or a sudden shift backward, their arms flail outward and then come back in. In the first few months of life, this is exactly what we want to see. It is the nervous system doing its job to keep a baby safe.
This reflex is supposed to integrate within those early months. As the brain matures, that full-body startle gets replaced by a more measured, age-appropriate response.
Here is what should happen. This is a 12 year old. When his body tips backward in that rocking motion, his arms should move with intention to protect and steady him, reaching toward support and helping him catch himself. That is a mature, controlled response. Instead, his arms flail outward in that wide startle pattern. That tells me the Moro reflex is still active, and his nervous system is reaching for a primitive response instead of the age-appropriate one. Same movement, very different meaning depending on age.
When this reflex stays active, it can look like a child who is overwhelmed in noisy rooms, who cannot tolerate bright lights, who is very jumpy or gets scared for no reason. Their nervous system is stuck in a sympathetic fight or flight state, so any little thing elicits that motor response, increases their cortisol, and drives the stress response. Over time this can predispose a child to anxiety, and that pattern can carry into adulthood.
#primitivereflex #childdevelopment #moro #anxiety #adhd
When I evaluated him, his Symmetric Tonic Neck Reflex was still active. It links the position of the head to the tone in the arms and legs, so that when the head bends forward the arms bend and the legs straighten, and when the head lifts the opposite happens. It is the reflex that helps a baby push up off the floor and prepare for crawling. It should be fully integrated by 11 months of age.
To test it, I place the child on hands and knees and have them slowly bring their head down toward the chest, then lift it back up. In a child whose STNR has integrated, the arms stay stable and the body holds its position. When the reflex is still active, the head moving down pulls the arms into a bend and the elbows start to give way, and lifting the head pushes the arms back into extension. Those bending elbows are the reflex showing itself.
When the STNR stays active, the link between head position and limb tone never releases. Every time he looks down at a desk, his body gets a signal to fold. Every time he looks up at the board, his body gets a signal to extend. He cannot hold a steady, upright posture while shifting his eyes between the page and the board, so he slumps, he wraps his legs around the chair, he leans on one hand, and he gets up. It looks like he cannot sit still. What is really happening is that his nervous system is fighting his body just to stay upright and pay attention.
This is why so many of these children are called lazy or distracted, when the truth is they are working harder than anyone in the room. His parents had been told he simply needed to try harder at school. He did not need to try harder. He had a primitive reflex that should have integrated when he was a baby and never did.
#primitivereflex #childdevelopment #crawling #developmentaldelays #adhd
Specific wavelengths of red and near infrared light pass through the scalp and skull and reach the brain cells underneath. Inside every brain cell are mitochondria, which are the tiny energy producers that keep neurons working. When light reaches the mitochondria, they generate more ATP, which is the fuel the brain runs on. A brain cell with more energy fires more efficiently, communicates with other cells more reliably, and forms the new connections that learning and behavioral change require.
When your child does therapy, plays, learns, or practices a new skill, their neurons need fuel to lay down those new pathways. Photobiomodulation gives the brain more of what it needs to do that work. A growing body of research in children and adults with ADHD shows real improvements in attention, working memory, and executive function with this therapy, along with measurable changes on brain imaging and EEG.
When we direct the laser at the right frontal lobe, we are targeting the region of the brain that runs focus, attention, impulse control, and emotional regulation.
#photobiomodulation #laser #redlight #ADHD #focus
Lai QJ, et al. Repetitive Transcranial Photobiomodulation Improves Working Memory and Attention in Adults with ADHD: A 4 Week Follow Up Study. Photobiomodul Photomed Laser Surg. 2025;43(5):190 to 197. PMID:
Lee TI, Ding Z, Chan AS. Can transcranial photobiomodulation improve cognitive function? A systematic review of human studies. Ageing Res Rev. 2023;83:101786. PMID:
Cassano P, et al. Selective photobiomodulation for emotion regulation: model based dosimetry study. Neurophotonics. 2019;6(1):015004. PMID:
When I evaluated him, his Palmar Grasp reflex was still active on both hands.
The Palmar Grasp is the reflex every baby is born with that makes them curl their fingers around anything that touches their palm. It is the reason a newborn will grip your finger the moment you place it in their hand. It should be fully integrated by 6 months of age.
Most people assume a retained Palmar Grasp only affects handwriting. It does, because the fingers cannot operate with the fine precision writing requires. But the impact reaches much further than the page.
When the Palmar Grasp stays active, the hand and the mouth stay neurologically linked. This is a connection every baby is born with, which is why infants stick their hands in their mouths constantly and why their tongue moves when they grip something. In a child whose Palmar Grasp never integrated, that link never breaks. The hand and the mouth are still wired together. You see it in children who chew their shirt collars, bite their nails, stick their tongue out when they are concentrating, and in the most significant presentations, in children whose tongue cannot move with the independence speech requires at all.
This is one of the pieces missing in so many nonverbal children. The tongue is not free. It cannot perform the precise, isolated movements that spoken language demands because at a neurological level, it is still wired to the hand. No amount of speech therapy can fully unlock language until that wiring is addressed.
His parents were told to keep doing speech therapy and give it more time. He did not need more time. He had a primitive reflex that should have integrated when he was a baby and never did. Until the reflex is addressed, the tongue cannot fully separate from the hand, and the words cannot come.
#primitivereflex #childdevelopment #nonverbal #palmargrasp
When I evaluated hm, I was looking at how his brain was functioning as a whole and along its developmental trajectory. The brain builds in sequences and pathways, and when certain areas are not fully developed, other areas try to compensate. He was able to speak, but not in an efficient way, which is why enunciation and clarity were so difficult. The areas responsible for movement, coordination, language, and social connection were not working together in a coordinated way, which is why these challenges were showing up across different areas.
In an intensive setting, we’re able to do multiple therapies throughout the day so the brain gets the repetition and consistency it needs. This allows us to work on the pathways involved in motor control, cerebellar function, sensory processing, and communication in a condensed period of time.
Even after his first day of treatment, his parents noticed more eye contact and more attempts to communicate. As we continued, his speech became clearer, he was able to express basic needs, and he started to engage more with the world around him. By the end of care, he was writing, communicating more clearly, socializing with other children, and doing extremely well in school.
#colombia #bogotoa #medellin #autismo #speechdelay
As we began working through primitive reflexes as part of Dylan’s neurorehabilitation program, we started to see changes within a few weeks. His eye contact improved and he became more aware of the people and environment around him. Then he started saying more words and began communicating in ways his mom had not seen before.
We also saw a major shift in his ability to engage. Dylan began following instructions more consistently and became more present during interactions. He started taking part in school activities, including school games and even a school dance, which was a very meaningful milestone for him and his mom.
Dylan began interacting with other children and started playing with peers, something that had previously been very difficult for him. His behavior changed as well. He had struggled with aggression in the past, but over time he became calmer, sweeter, and more emotionally connected to the people around him.
We also saw improvements in coordination. Dylan had previously struggled with balance and body awareness, but as his nervous system became more organized, his movements became more coordinated.
In neurology, we say that a more organized brain produces more organized output. As Dylan’s foundational brain patterns were addressed, higher cortical areas became more accessible, supporting improvements in communication, social interaction, emotional regulation, attention, and motor coordination.
We are deeply grateful to have had the opportunity to work with Dylan and his family and to see these changes unfold.
#primitivereflexes #autismo #adhd #brain
When we evaluated Angelo, we found multiple retained primitive reflexes that had never been assessed before. Primitive reflexes are early movement patterns that should integrate in infancy as the nervous system matures. When they remain active, the brain continues to operate from a more primitive level, affecting speech, fine motor control, emotional regulation, behavior, and social connection.
In Angelo’s case, a retained rooting reflex, which should integrate around 6 months of age, was still present and impacting oral motor control and speech clarity. A retained grasp reflex was also contributing to fine motor difficulties. These reflexes were limiting how efficiently his brain could organize movement, speech, and behavior.
As we worked through primitive reflexes as part of his neurorehabilitation, we began to see clear changes. Angelo’s speech became easier to understand, to the point where he no longer relies on a tablet or phone to communicate. His fine motor control improved as well, giving him more independence and confidence.
In neurology, we often say that a more organized brain produces more organized output. As foundational patterns were addressed, higher cortical areas became more accessible, which also supported improvements in behavior, emotional regulation, and social engagement.
We are deeply grateful to have had the opportunity to work with Angelo and to see how much can change when a person is finally able to be understood. Witnessing his progress, confidence, and connection has been a privilege and a truly special journey for our team.
#primitivereflexes #autism #autismo #adhd #braindevelopment
Vital Brain Institute's engagement
Vital Brain Institute's engagement rate on Instagram is 3.19%, between 3% and 6%, or 3 to 6 likes and comments per 100 followers. On a typical post that comes to about 1 like or comment for every 31 followers. An average post collects 951 likes and 21 comments, close to 45 likes for each comment.
Engagement rate
3.19%
- Avg likes
- 951
- Avg comments
- 21
- Interactions : followers
- 1 : 31
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Who is Vital Brain Institute?
Vital Brain Institute (@vitalbraininstitute) is a Medical & health creator on Instagram, also filed under Healthcare. Vital Brain Institute is set up as an Instagram business account. The Instagram bio for Vital Brain Institute runs to 11 words across 3 lines.
How many followers does Vital Brain Institute have?
Vital Brain Institute has 25,373 followers on Instagram (25.4K). Set against 488 accounts followed, the audience works out to about 52 followers per account Vital Brain Institute follows. 168 published posts give Vital Brain Institute a moderate archive on Instagram.
What is Vital Brain Institute's engagement rate?
Vital Brain Institute's engagement rate on Instagram is 3.19%, between 3% and 6%, or 3 to 6 likes and comments per 100 followers. On a typical post that comes to about 1 like or comment for every 31 followers. An average post collects 951 likes and 21 comments, close to 45 likes for each comment.
What does Vital Brain Institute post about on Instagram?
Flinque files Vital Brain Institute under Medical & health, with Healthcare as a secondary category. All 10 recent posts Flinque holds for Vital Brain Institute are videos. The 10 recent Instagram captions Flinque holds for Vital Brain Institute repeatedly use the words primitive, still, should, child and active. Vital Brain Institute's captions carry hashtags such as #autismo, #adhd and #primitivereflexes. Vital Brain Institute writes those captions mainly in English. Vital Brain Institute keeps 1 story highlight, which open with a free Flinque account.
How do I contact Vital Brain Institute for a collaboration?
Vital Brain Institute's contact details are not published on Flinque's public profile. The Instagram bio links to 1 external site, and a free Flinque account opens that link. The account is registered as an Instagram business account. Brands with a free Flinque account can shortlist Vital Brain Institute and use Flinque's outreach tools wherever a contact route is on file.
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