Sensory Processing- visual stuff

[NacMacFeegle]

Hello. I was here a lot a while ago, but been away and namechanged etc.

Background: DS1 has had a DX of SPD since the age of 2.10, and was DX'd with HFA at 4. He is now 5 1/2 and still going through some assessment stuff.

Anyway, the eye assessments are nearly done - he has such a marked sensitivity to light that he wears tinted glasses at all waking times. Anyway, it has come back that there is no physical reason for the reaction, but the opthamologist said it isn't behavioural, there is a definite reaction - which ties in with the SPD I suppose.

I am stupidly a bit about this, it would almost be easier to have a physical explanation (people often ask about his glasses), but overall of course I am very glad it is nothing serious.

We are doing assessments for coloured lenses too, once a month. I find it a bit... well, WOO, but I am going along with it for now.

Has anyone else used coloured lenses? Or does anyone have any links to actual useful research? I am really struggling to find much, but I might not be looking properly!

I don't have any personal knowledge of them, however, an acquaintance of mine stated that her DD needs a certain coloured lenses in her glasses because she cannot read without them - the letters just jump all over the page - some type of dyslexia thing that appeared suddenly and is fixed by these coloured glasses. She was a bit puzzled by it all as well, but it was very much a "if it works, fine"

That's kind of my thinking - although I'm inwardly screaming "WOOO, it's WOO and it's BOLLOCKS," I have already seen some surprising things in the tests.

DS1 isn't dyslexic, but speech is very poor - with one colour, his speech worsened to unintelligable, with another, it was almost like an average 5 year old. Catching balls and such like easier too. I need numbers and double blind trials and EVIDENCE, dammit!

Scopitopic (sp?) sensitivity - or some word like that. On my phone now so can't google.

Also irlen syndrome.

I would definately recommend going to a behaviour optometrist who checks tottally diff things to an opthamologist.

I'd also recommend notbeing so sceptical. How is being sceptical going to help your son? Whatever the research says coloured lenses either will or won't help your son. And if the do help your son you'd be mad to turn them down just because you can't find a published academic research saying why they help dome people.

scotopic sensitivity

If you ggogle Professor Arnold Wilkins he is based at Essex Uni in COlchester. He has carried out research on visual stress & created aot of the standard tests.
He also does the coloured lens testing & has an interest in ASD.

Everything i have read has indicated that 5 is a little young to have a correct colour assessment carried out, do you have confidence in the ability of the tester and in your ds's ability to correctly indicate how each colour effects his vision & ability etc.

Thanks for replies/ links.

Indigo, thanks for link. I find it is essential to be sceptical, as there is so much psuedo-science out there. DS1 had surgery last year, which I now believe was utterly uneccessary. I don't take people's word for it any more.

Anon, thanks. The tester has said he doesn't normally work with 5 year olds, but he's broken the test down and DS1 can recognise numbers/ words enough to do it in small chunks, but not sure how reliable his self-reporting is - for example, he has the flu this week, temp of 40 and glands up/ hacking cough - but he's "just fine thanks."

He was asked to count backwards from 20, with red lenses was barely able to do it, wouldn't lift head etc, with green lenses was confident and did it immediately. Marked difference, very strange.

I'm interested in this. There is a local Optometrist who does colour overlay tests like this for only £22 which to me sounds well worth it to see whether this might help DS's concentration in class.

Go to a behaviour optometrist if you can. An optician did a colour overlay test on my DD and got it totally wrong.

But my first suggestion to help with concentration would be to try Omega Fish Oil.

I think colour overlays are unlikely to help with concentration unless he also complains about words moving or bright light or something else vision based.

Thanks Indigo. I'll try the Omega Fish Oil. Chemist here I come!

Read professor Wilkins stuff, it goes some way to explain why the colours help with the concentration. Its about reducing the visual stress rather than clarity of vision IYKWIM

Lenin, it's quite a big reaction. DS1 cries with pain when the optician shines a light in his eyes. He had what looked like conjunctivitis more or less constantly (not pussy, but red, swollen eyes) until he got the glasses. The opthamologist said that the reaction was marked and abnormal, he came to that conclusion just by looking at his eyes. DS1 doesn't normally really report pain, so it must be reasonably bad.

I genuinely had thought that he might have albinism, his optician also thought so, but it seems not. One thing I've noticed is that his pupils always look large compared to other people in the same light environment, and often in photos (which he obviously hates) he has white eye rather than red, and he never has normal eyes in a flash photo.

google Ian Jordan, we have been to him on a yearly basis for coloured lens.

Lenin, I have just stumbled upon this professor person Dr. Amanda Ludlow and emailed her, I don't know if important academic bods talk to mere mortals, but the stuff she is doing is extremely relevant to DS1.

Nac, is a private Opthamologist or NHS?

I only ask, because ds2 was referred to the eye hospital for what we thought was a minor eye problem and they discovered a lot of problems with his eyes, including the fact that he wasn't producing enough tears - which led to red eyes and photophobia. We had no idea, he still produced tears when he cried and never complained about his eyes itching or feeling dry. He also had pitting to the sclera, which the consultants had never seen before and didn't have a clue what the cause was. They now think it might have been viral and fortunately it resolved with a long period of using artificial tear drops and stringent lid cleansing.

Anyway, I'm wandering off again.

In our case a normal optician had completely missed all of these problems and ds could have lost his sight in one eye if it had continued for much longer.

(Thanks again for all your advice. We've now been given the name and number of a cheaper BABO and are hoping to have ds1 assessed late February, early March - once we've finished with the current round of endless appoinments. )

Just realised my last sentence to Nac, sounded a bit abrupt and scary - sorry.

All I meant was, if the guy you are seeing is private, it might be worth getting your GP to refer you as well as a back up plan to get everthing double checked.

We've seen a normal optician

An optometrist (unclear as to difference, not sure there is one?)

Then the consultant Opthamologist this week.

The inital optician did the referral, which took 6 months, but missed the long sight. He initially did the tinted lenses though, and to be fair, it is hard to assess someone who is refusing to open their eyes.

The optometrist had far more luck, she dimmed the lights in the room before we even came in, kept it so calm, and apart from 20 mins of screaming with the drops, he co-operated beautifully. He even tried so hard to co-operate with the drops, but just couldn't do it bless him! She is wonderful, and I wish she wasn't 30 miles away, total PITA!

The consultant is NHS though, and seemed satisfied that there was no obvious reason for the photophobia. I am mostly happy with that, although still a bit niggly-worried.

Don't worry, I was neither offended nor scared ;)

Lenin, I have emailed her, fingers crossed!