300 Longwood Avenue Boston, MA 02115 (617) 355-6000 Research: Christopher Walsh and Bernard Chang on brain abnormalities in dyslexia Forms of dyslexia that are marked by poor reading fluency -- an inability to read rapidly and smoothly -- may be caused by disorganized, meandering tracts of nerve fibers in the brain, according to Christopher Walsh, MD, PhD, Bernard Chang, MD, and Tami Katzir, PhD. Their study, which uses the latest imaging methods, gives researchers a glimpse of what may go wrong in the structure of some dyslexic readers' brains. They looked at a type of dyslexia caused by a particular genetic disorder -- periventricular nodular heterotopia, or PNH. For more, view the video clips below or go to the press release. Christopher Walsh, MD, PhD Christopher Walsh, MD, PhD, is chief of the Division of Genetics at Children's Hospital Boston and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. In this interview, conducted on November 28, 2007, Dr. Walsh discusses the study and its findings. You studied patients with a rare genetic disorder, PNH, that happens to cause dyslexia, rather than ordinary people with dyslexia. Why? [1.5 MB] View clip... What type of reading problem did these patients have? [3.1 MB] View clip... Is this a type of problem that's common in dyslexia generally? [0.8 MB] View clip... What did you find when you studied their brains? [1.9 MB] View clip... How might these abnormalities make it harder for people to read? [1.2 MB] View clip... Do other people with dyslexia who don't have PNH show a similar disorganization? [1.8 MB] View clip... Is there any way these findings might help people with dyslexia in the future? [2.1 MB] View clip... Bernard Chang, MD Bernard Chang, MD, a neurologist at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, discusses the reasons for studying the relatively rare disorder PNH and what they've learned about how the brain performs the cognitive function of reading. Bernard Chang [5.2 MB] View clip... [Note: The free QuickTime player is required to view these video clips. If you can hear the audio but see no picture, you may need to install a more recent version of QuickTime.] The information on this website should not be taken as medical advice, which can only be given to you by your personal health care professional. Copyright © Children's Hospital Boston. All rights reserved.