| Author | |
JenniferS
Forum All-Star
Joined: Nov 09 2006
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 1049
|
| Posted: July 27 2007 at 11:50am | IP Logged
|
 |
|
Has anyone heard of this? The eye doctor that we just took our two boys to see said that our oldest son's conidition is sometimes referred to as Brown's Syndrome. I am going to look it up on a search engine pretty soon.
I was really impressed with this eye doctor. He spent close to two hours with us. He evaluated each of the boys. He really thinks he can help our five year old. He is not sure about our eight year old. Samuel(8) has a pretty serious conidition. His eyes will not work together.(We already knew this.) The doctor is not sure whether vision therapy will help. He wants to evaluate Samuel further.
We really liked this doctor. He spent a lot of time with us. He even had glasses that could mimic the way the boys see things. It was incredible to see how they see the world. Infact, it gave me a headache and made me sick to my stomach.
He gave us exercises to work on at home. Our younger boy does them well. Samuel struggles, but he is willing to try. so...we are praying that we can help Samuel regain some binocular vision.
Anyway...it was interesting.
Jen
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
wahoo92
Forum Rookie
Joined: Sept 30 2006
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 59
|
| Posted: July 27 2007 at 2:14pm | IP Logged
|
|
|
I'm going to do this off-the-cuff due to lack of time to look up the exact terms. Brown's Syndrome is either a congenital shortening or tightening of the eye muscle that allows your eye to move up and out to the side. It can also be acquired, although I can't remember how (some kind of arthritis, I think). It may be hard to find too much info. because it is a)rare and b) often a self-limiting condition with few implications for the affected. I remember finding only one or two layman's articles about the condition when I was trying to find out more five years ago when my now six-year-old (almost) was diagnosed. It is helpful if you can go to a pediatric opthamologist due to the infrequency of the condition, especially if your child needs surgery, but there are few of them around.
I noticed my daughter's condition when, at around 7/8 months of age I noticed an occasional misalignment of her eyes and that, when sitting, she would often tilt her head back unusually far to see things above her (as opposed to glancing with her eyes). I couldn't pinpoint what she was doing, I just started thinking worse case scenarios and was worried about a tumor or something causing odd posturing.
We were sent to the peds. opth. who diagnosed her. She, as well as most kids with the syndrome, was compensating for the limitation imposed by the tight/short muscle by changing her head position. Your brain doesn't want your eyes looking in two different directions, so ideally, if that happens you self correct by changing the position of your body/head (or in the case of "lazy eye"-patching the good eye to force the other eye to work harder to align with the good eye so that they see together). As long as you are compensating, there are no problems. They have monitored Madeline every six months until recently to make sure that she is still doing this. The problem comes when, for whatever reason, you don't compensate and the eyes don't work together which will eventually make you lose some sight in that eye as your brain does everything that it can to keep from having double vision. (again, remember this is from memory-you need to read the information for yourself to verify my accuracy). This is when surgery may come into play. I also think that depending on the severity of your child's case, they may be able to tell immediately whether your son is one who would benefit from wait-and-see or surgical correction. It sounds also like your children may have other issues going on which, obviously, would need to be taken into consideration.
At our last visit he declared Madeline nearly free of Brown's and isn't going to see her again for several years. He has been amazed at how she has shown less and less of the Syndrome over the last few years. He remarked that it is somewhat of a medical enigma now as to why what was previously thought of as an incurable syndrome is now beginning to be "outgrown" by many of the children affected by it. He explained some theories behind this that I won't bother to go into now, but I found it really interesting.
He always reminded me at each visit that the effects of the syndrome become less and less as the child grows taller since they have to look up less and less. I thought that was kind of funny. No pilot career for Madeline, but it shouldn't affect her ability to do anything else.
Hope this helps. It's always hard having something that no one has heard of. If I have time, I'll try and track down the ONE site that had some helpful information on it. I printed it out for the grandparents and our family doctor.
Good luck.
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
wahoo92
Forum Rookie
Joined: Sept 30 2006
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 59
|
| Posted: July 27 2007 at 2:15pm | IP Logged
|
|
|
Forgot to sign my name.
Sarah
mom of Ellie, almost 9, Madeline, almost 6, and Lucy, 3
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
wahoo92
Forum Rookie
Joined: Sept 30 2006
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 59
|
| Posted: July 27 2007 at 2:22pm | IP Logged
|
|
|
Okay, a lot changes in five years. There are now many sites with info. on Browns, which you have likely already discovered. This was the first one that I came to that seems to have all the info. and be easy to understand.
www.aapos.org/displaycommon.cfm?an=1&subarticlenbr=71
Sarah
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
Caroline
Forum All-Star
Joined: March 04 2006
Location: California
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 706
|
| Posted: July 27 2007 at 2:53pm | IP Logged
|
|
|
Jen my 3yo ds was diagnosed with this. He has a mild case and is able to compensate for it with minor posturing (he slightly tilts his head). He saw a surgeon last month who felt that unless the posturing became severe she wouldn't recommend surgery. We do patch him so that the vision is his eye won't deteriorate.
Sarah, thank you for your experience. It was very encouraging!
__________________
Devoted Wife to  and Mama to three beautiful boys and another little boy due in September , and two beautiful souls in heaven
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
JenniferS
Forum All-Star
Joined: Nov 09 2006
Online Status: Offline
Posts: 1049
|
| Posted: July 28 2007 at 12:32pm | IP Logged
|
|
|
Thanks, My ds has been going to a pediatric opthamologist for many years now, and he has been through four surgeries. We went to another doctor recently, as we have become less and less satisfied with the pediatric opthamologist. This new doctro gave us way more info. Ds had a severe head tilt(it practically laid on his shoulder) when he was little. Each eye would shut down at different times in order to cmopensate. Although we asked questions, the opthamologist never explained things to us, and she basically told us she would cure him with surgeries. I think that the first two surgeries were necessary because of the severe head tilt. But I am not sure about the following two, or the fact that she seems to be leaning toward more. He no longer has the head tilt, but his eyes will not work together. It's very evident when we do the eye therapy exercises that the new doctor gave us( we noticed it during daily school work, too). And the new doctor was honest. Samuel may not get anything from this therapy, but we are willing to give it a try for awhile. He really compensates well. He can hit a baseball and play a mean socer game, which baffles the eye doctor. Samuel has almost no binocular vision, therefore very little depth perception. I have found that different doctors have different methods, and we have to rind which one we are comfortable with.
I do appreciate all fo your input. Thank you.
|
| Back to Top |
|
| |
|
|
4Real Forums : Special Blessings
Topic: Brown’s Syndrome
