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dyslexia after brain injury?

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In December my 10 year old got meningitis. After he was hospitalized he developed fluid on the brain and swelling in the cerebellum bilaterally. He was in a coma and intubated. They put a shunt in to relieve some of the pressure and then airlifted him to a pediatrics specialty hospital in kc. Long story short, 3 weeks later he was finally released, walking and talking. The only scar was the one on his head from the surgery. He had some limited testing with physical therapy and also with occupational therapy. occ therapy did make note that he was having trouble saying his abcs which obviously he knew before. But otherwise they gave him the go to return to school. The last two spelling tests sent home I couldn't believe. Words he knew before were spelled so horribly. Sometimes the right letters but in the wrong places, mistakes like that. I spoke to his teacher on Friday and she said she noticed it in spelling, but also in reading comprehension. He would skip words or just read the wrong word outloud period. She said he was also having the same issues with retaining new skills, and mixing up his math problems.

He was an honor student before, this has to be a complication of when he was sick. I found information at the library and online about dyslexia after cerebellum disfunction. In fact in one paper it said 80% of patients can experience it.

So, my questions are this...have you ever heard of dyslexia onset after brain injury? And what do I do now to get him some help?

btw, I did call a child psychologist for testing and he told me dyslexia doesn't exist. Then tried to sell me some biofeedback package at 3k that of course my insurance won't even touch. What do I look for in a doctor? And what type of doctor do I need to contact? The neurologist says it's not his field, outside of the new mri he took, and my primary physician says contact the school again.

Sorry this is so long....thanks in advance for any responses.

steph
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replied April 28th, 2009
The psychologist really said "dyslexia doesn't exist?" Huh?? My brother had severe dyslexia at one time. But for some odd reason the dyslexia has disappeared and he is now an honor student in college getting a Master's degree in business. But I'm afraid that I'm getting dyslexia because for some odd reason (even though I still can read somehow) it looks like I'm looking at a different language but it does take longer to process the words. This is after having the total opposite problem for my whole life, known as Hyperlexia. In fact I learned how to read at 3. I am also autistic and this is very common. There is such a disorder called "Acquired Dyslexia" which can happen after a brain injury. I just found out Acquired Dyslexia exists a few days ago. Half the time when I type, I write the words backwards and need to correct them. But at least at this point I realize it! So, you can check up that disorder.
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