Although dyslexia is the most common learning disability in the United States, a lot of people misunderstand the condition.
Because many people have dyslexia but are never diagnosed it is difficult to approximate how many people suffer from the condition. The Dyslexia Research Institute estimates between 10 and 15 percent of the U.S. population has dyslexia and that only about one out of every 20 dyslexics are recognized and receive assistance.
“I think there is a big misconception of what dyslexia is,” says Anne Hahnel, a speech language pathologist in St. Elizabeth Healthcare’s Department of Audiology and Speech Pathology. “They think it’s seeing letters backwards or reversing them.” But dyslexia isn’t a vision problem nor is it an indication of intelligence. Many people with dyslexia have normal or above average intelligence. (Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison, Pablo Picasso and Leonardo de Vinci were all reported to have had dyslexia.)
Rather, dyslexia is actually a language-based problem. People with dyslexia have trouble processing the distinctive sounds (phenomes) that make up words. It also often runs in families.
A multi-part assessment to test an individual’s listening and oral comprehension skills, auditory processing abilities (their ability to hear phonetic sounds and break words into phonetic units) and basic academic skills (reading comprehension, spelling, ability to express their thoughts in writing, and math skills) can result in a diagnosis and ““ more importantly ““ a strategy for addressing the problem.
“My job is to find out what’s easy and what’s hard for the individual,” says Hahnel.
Often, when discussing the results of a child’s assessment with parents she hears, “Gee, that’s just like me.”
“A lot of people don’t realize that dyslexia runs in families and that you don’t outgrow it: you overcome it.”
