Source: Daily Mail >> Read full article and comment
By HILARY FREEMAN
Last updated at 1:10 AM on 21st March 2010
Tom Heaffey is a bright 18-year-old with a string of good GCSEs who wants to be an architect. Yet just three years ago, he was virtually illiterate and predicted to fail his exams.
Remarkably, his life has been transformed by a pair of blue-tinted glasses, which have enabled him to read properly for the first time.
Tom, who lives near Norwich and is a BTech art and design student, suffers from a neurological condition called Meares-Irlen syndrome, also known as visual stress.
Without glasses, when he looks at a printed page, the text appears to jump about, blur and distort. Other symptoms include headaches and migraines.
Shades: Tom Heaffey, mother Sarah and the blue-tinted glasses that changed his life
Some degree of visual stress may affect up to 20 per cent of the population. When Tom was a child, his mother Sarah, 50, knew he was underperforming at school.
‘He used to say the words were “fizzing”. Eye tests showed his sight was normal, so his teachers concluded he was a slow learner.’
‘Trying to read was exhausting and gave me headaches, so I couldn’t concentrate for long,’ recalls Tom.
It was not until three years ago, just months before his GCSEs, that he was diagnosed with Meares-Irlen.
According to Arnold Wilkins, professor of visual perception at Essex University, the condition is a result of the neurons in the visual part of the brain firing too strongly.
‘Different neurons in the brain react to different colours,’ explains ProfWilkins. ‘We discovered that using tinted lenses and overlays reduces the overactivity of these neurons.’
As a patient will respond differently to each hue, Prof Wilkins developed the Intuitive Colorimeter, a testing device that diagnoses the exact colour an individual needs.
Patients are asked to read text on a machine that can generate 110,000 different hues. The correct shade will allow the patient to read clearly. This information is used to make the right tint of coloured lens… … Continue Reading
