Dyslexia

What is Dyslexia?

Literally, dyslexia means difficulty reading words. As most clinical conditions, however, dyslexia exists on a continuum. There are two main forms of dyslexia, developmental dyslexia and acquired dyslexia.

The acquired form typically occurs if you have trauma or bleeding in the brain that affects the pathways involved in reading. If someone can’t read at all, we call that alexia. If reading is possible but labored, we call that dyslexia. For more information about this form of dyslexia, see our page on neuro optometric rehabilitation and brain injuries.

Developmental dyslexia is the type of reading disorder that children face when they have difficulty in learning how to read. It may surprise you to learn that it was an ophthalmologist (eye surgeon) by the name of Hinshelwood who originally focused attention on developmental dyslexia in a series of papers written in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

Unfortunately contemporary ophthalmologists have distanced themselves from informed knowledge in the field, something we’ll address in the treatment section.

Most educators have shied away from using the term dyslexia, preferring instead to use terms such as specific reading disability.

Even today, in New Jersey, many parents are told that their child can’t be tested for dyslexia until age 10. Developmental dyslexia can be divided into three main subtypes:

Dysphonesia – the auditory or phonetic type in which there is a disability in associating symbols with sounds. Phonemic awareness is poor.
Dyseidesia – the visual type in which there are deficits in vision and memory of letters and word shapes limiting the ability to develop a sight word vocabulary. However they have the ability to acquire adequate phonetic skills.
Mixed type combining features of the dysphonetic and dyseidetic.

Lately attention has been focused on the idea that developmental dyslexia is different pattern in the wiring of the brain that predisposes people to have talents or gifts in areas other than reading. Two prominent physicians, Brock and Fernette Eide, have written a book about the potential benefits and advantages of developmental dyslexia.

There is a very important blog that the Doctors Eide have written, which puts the visual aspect of dyslexia into perspective. They write:

“While not all children or adults with dyslexia have visual processing problems, many–at least two-thirds in some studies–do. This makes sense from a neurological standpoint, because several of the structural neurological features associated with dyslexia appear to predispose to visual difficulties.

For example, coordinated control of the movements of the two eyes requires sending signals over long distances in white matter tracts, as well as sharing information between the two hemispheres of the brain, and oversight, modulation, and coordination by the cerebellum. Deficiencies in white matter function, interhemispheric communication, and cerebellar function are each known to be more common in dyslexic than non-dyslexic individuals (especially in the pre-adult years).

In addition, many dyslexic children are known to have difficulty with muscular coordination, especially for fine motor actions. Consequently, it should not be surprising that their visual movement functions, which are controlled by many of the same neural pathways, are also poorly coordinated.”

Dr. Brock Eide and Dr. Fernette Eide

Jessica’s Mother

For additonal information, please refer to the Eide Neurolearning Blog.

For additonal information, check out our Dyslexia and Vision Blog and Vision and Reading Blog.

Signs of Dyslexia

As previously noted, dyslexia exists on a continuum. Let’s start first with an example of a child with a severe form of dyslexia. Before any patient begins vision therapy in our office, we have them complete a survey form asking three basic questions.

If they’re unable to read the question, we read it to them. Here is what Jason, a second grader who had been tutored unsuccessfully for two years, wrote on his survey form:

Question 1: Why Do You Think You Are Here?

Jason wrote: To helmp me reed To wake wy rite Eay stonogr

Question 2: What Are Your Goals?

Jason wrote: Not to yoos wy fuingr to reed to wake wy rite eay stogr

Question 3: Do You Have Any Idea How This Will Help You In School?

Jason wrote: Thith will huelp me To see my pagus Klere

What do you notice? Jason shows features of dyslexia that are classic in terms of letter transpositions, reversals, and inversions. Look how Jason flips the “m” for a “w”. Letters are often out of sequence.

He has a poor concept of word spacing, capitalization, and grammar. He has features of a mixed type of dyslexia, poor in phonemic awareness and in both sight word recognition and expression.

Both encoding and decoding of words are challenging. How words are formed are a mystery to him and he’s inconsistent in how he guesses words should look even when he’s trying to spell phonetically.

Old school says that dyslexics simply reverse things.

Old school says that dyslexics simply reverse things

It is old school to say that dyslexics simply reverse things, but reversals remain one sign that many dyslexics share in common most notably confusion of “b” and “d”. There can also be reversals of numbers, like a 3 backwards.

There can be transposition of number sequences, like “21” instead of “12”, just like there are letter transpositions, like “was” instead of “saw”. Additionally, there can be substitutions of similar looking words like “these” and “there”.

Signs of the visual form of dyslexia include problems in sequencing or placing things in the right order. Words are frequently misspelled and reading fluency is limited by both poor sight word recognition or vocabulary, and difficulty in following the flow of print while reading. This is thought to be related to poor visual sequential memory.

Visual Processing and Visual Efficiency

These are all issues in what we call visual processing or perception. Think of this as the software of the visual parts of the brain. But don’t forget that software is only as good as the hardware that runs it.

Therefore, any consideration of visual dyslexia is incomplete until you know how the eyes are working in concert with the brain. This is what we call visual efficiency, and involves focusing, tracking, and eye teaming.

This is crucial in making sure that print is coming in clear, single, and stable. It is more of a factor once someone knows how to read but is having difficulty doing so.

Signs of visual inefficiency include print wiggling, shimmering, ghosting, blurring, or doubling. This often results in fatigue, headaches, or loss of place when reading.

Our Treatment

The majority of patients who come to us with reading difficulties have already had a variety of interventions with varying degrees of success. Typically someone, such as an educator or occupational therapist, feels that there is a missing link between a child’s intelligence and the response to prior interventions. Treatment therefore begins with an understanding of what has been tried before, and what resulted.

We always conduct a conference with the patient or parents to review our findings from the evaluation. If our evaluation shows that problems in visual efficiency or visual processing can account for key signs or symptoms that a patient is exhibiting, we customize a treatment plan.

This may consist of a prescription for lenses or prisms, or active optometric vision therapy. Targeted interventions include focusing, eye teaming and tracking, as well as visual perception.

Visual Crowding is a significant factor in visual dyslexia

Visual crowding is a significant factor in visual dyslexia and is a form of visual sensory overload. Therapy to address this includes computerized as well as non-computerized activities.

Guided reading programs using a moving window help to balance reading speed with comprehension with the goal to attain improved fluency. When appropriate, we make recommendations for Section 504 accommodations that include enlarged print size, which helps to reduce crowding, but does not get at the source of the problem which is within the visual brain.

The three primary educational interventions to address word recognition and reading readiness in dyslexia are Orton-Gillingham, Wilson, and Lindamood-Bell. Our treatment incorporates principles involved in each of these approaches, based on technologies such as PACE and Master the Code. Rather than being rooted to a particular method, we evaluate each child individually to customize an approach likely to result in the best outcome for visually based reading problems.

The Vision & Learning Center

The first step in helping an individual with dyslexia is understanding that we work in a multidisciplinary framework. Rarely, if ever, are we the first professionals consulted when someone has significant reading disability. That’s good news and bad news.

The good news is that we don’t have to guess as other interventions often have been tried first. Most patients who have been diagnosed with dyslexia, or suspected of having dyslexia, have already tried a number of different educational interventions. It is helpful for us to review what has been tried already and what the response to intervention has been.ted.

Before recommending visual intervention for dyslexia, we carefully look at how the eyes are taking in information when reading and compare that to how the visual areas in the brain are working together with language areas in the brain. That helps us to decide whether visual interventions are likely to be helpful and, if so, the areas in which to concentrate.

Specialized eye movement sensors help us measure precisely what a patient’s eyes are doing while reading.

We can tell how many stops per line you are making, how many times your eyes back-track to re-read, and your visual speed while tracking.

The Dyslexia Screener helps us identify whether the reading disability stems more from dyseidetic or visual origins as compared to dysphonetic or auditory/phonic origins. We also administer the Test of Silent Word Reading Fluency (TOSWRF) in addition to other tests that help us pinpoint where visual processing deficits occur that compound dyslexia.

A conference is held after we complete our evaluation to review the results and to make recommendations for intervention if indicated.

Insurance and Payment Plans

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No Problem!

At PressVision, we know how confusing insurance can be for our patients. Our patients appreciate that we go the extra mile when it comes to helping our patients and their families deal with their insurance provider.

Making Insurance Make Sense

We will explain how your deductible works. We’ll also explain what services are fully or partially covered. We’ll also tell you what services are unlikely to be covered. Based on our experience, we’ll even give you our estimate of what you can expect back from your insurance company.

Insurance Submission

We also take care of submitting all required paperwork to your insurance company. We do this every day, and we know the ins and outs of getting insurance claims submitted properly to your insurer.

What to Expect

Insurance providers are always changing coverages for services. While we can’t guarantee that your insurance company will approve or cover all provided services, you can be sure that we will fully explain everything to you and properly submit all required paperwork to your insurer.

Our Modern Fair Lawn Office

Our office is warm and welcoming to both adults and children. We have the latest technology to assist with proper diagnosis and with vision therapy.

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Dyslexia

What is Dyslexia?