Dr. Lea Hyvärinen
Dr. Lea Hyvärinen is a world renowned pediatric ophthalmologist from Helsinki, Finland who has been working in the areas of psychophysics of vision and in the development of visually impaired children for over 30 years. She is a Senior Lecturer at the University of Oulu and at the University of Tampere in Finland and has professor competence since 1992.
Dr. Hyvärinen began her research in experimental fluorescein angiography at the University of Helsinki, Finland and continued in the field of clinical research at Wilmer Eye Institute at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore MD from 1967-70. Most of her research on contrast sensitivity and on the development of visually impaired infants was completed in Helsinki in the 1970's and 80's. In 1987 she spent a sabbatical year at Smith Kettlewell Eye Research Institute of San Francisco writing, "Assessment of Vision and Hearing of Deaf-Blind Persons".
Lea helped to create services for visually impaired children by training low vision clinic teams in 1984 in Madrid and after that in all Nordic countries, Portugal, Brazil, Pakistan, China, Russia and all Baltic countries, and special educators in Ethiopia, Kenya, Germany, Italy, Portugal, China, USA, Canada, Argentina, Uruguay and Mexico
Lea shares her expertise lecturing throughout the world and through the publication of over 200 articles. She is best known for her work with infants and children with multiple disabilities, for the development of vision assessment tools in all areas of vision testing for all ages and functioning levels (Lea Test System).
Besides the hundreds of lectures and presentations Dr. Hyvärinen has done around the world she in the only person on the World Health Organization (WHO) representing pediatric vision. She was awarded a Professorship honoris causa at the Dortmund University, which represents the respect she has in the field.
Cortical/Cerebral Visual Impairment (CVI) is now the leading cause of vision impairment in children in the U. S. It is a very complex vision disorder that is just beginning to be understood. Lea has been working in diagnosis, evaluation and therapeutic interventions with young children with CVI and is known world wide as an expert in this area. Her CVI lectures were first presented as a web-cast series via the internet, sponsored by the VIISA Project at the SKI-HI Institute, Utah State University with Elizabeth Dennison as the web-cast director. The entire web-cast CVI lecture series is available on CDs.
Her practices are innovative in that she goes into homes and schools to assess the vision of children and handicapped adults. Her test development is often an extension of meeting her testing needs. Her vision screening test using symbols was developed to overcome the language barrier when testing vision in Third World countries.
Dr. Hyvärinen continues to offer the field unique and extraordinary contributions including her outstanding teaching website which is in five languages, www.lea-test.fi . Lea has dedicated her life to improving the quality of life of all ages. She has done this through her travels around the world teaching, consulting, testing and assessing the vision of the “world’s” people. Her gentle, caring and loving spirit transcends into her work around the world.
A NOTE FROM KATHLEEN APPLEBY (Vision Associates proprietress)
I have had the privilege of becoming a friend of Lea’s as we have worked, traveled and discussed "visions" of improving the quality of assessment and intervention of children with special needs, since 1994. I continue to be in awe of how dedicated she is in all that she does and the enormous contributions she has made in the world. Lea, in my mind, is the "Tiffany" of our day whose tremendous contributions will not be fully appreciated in her lifetime. I’m thankful for the “journey” and all that she has taught me.
Read on if you would like a "peek" into her travels and contributions to world, as I have saved some exerts of emails she has sent over the years. Get a cup of coffee and sit back and enjoy "travels with Lea.".....
"I have had a GREAT day today working at one of our best rehabilitation centres. We assessed and discussed rehabilitation of three young girls and could do it without hurrying. I am blessed with so many good co-workers. Greetings from Wintry Finland, Lea"
"I had copied the information on my small computer and wrote one abstract quite ready while sitting on the train from Turku. It is called: Infants and Toddler, how to assess? I intended to write another abstract on classification for a workshop but got such a long call from the School of the Visually Impaired that I did not get that abstract ready. I am now in Kikuyu working on the Low Vision Clinic. More later today, Lea"
"In order to support your project I would be glad to donate several LEA puzzles that can be used by the children several days before the examination and as an introduction of the assessment. When I start to examine a child I let the child play with the LEA Puzzle while I discuss the child's condition with the mother/guardian. The child sits on the mother's lap and usually becomes quite relaxed when a plaything is the first thing that is shown. Just let me know whether this might help you. Even if I leave for Kikuyu, I do not disappear. I should be able to read my e-mail in Kenya and in Tansania and Sept. 4-5 I will be in Geneva".
"Hello all!
This looks good. Do I remember correctly: we will use the day mainly to discuss visual pathways and cerebral visual impairment? I enclose a new text that repeats many things. It is a position paper for a meeting at WHO in Geneva on Sept.4. If you have time to comment (and correct my English) I will appreciate it very much. I leave for Kenya and Tansania on Saturday morning. I have to fly back to Geneva from Nairobi in the middle of my working period in East Africa but the WHO meeting is so important that I will do it. There is no-one else representing pediatric low vision. We can discuss the details of my lectures when I return. I can read my mail also in Kikuyu so if you have time to write your wishes, I can start preparations for the lectures during the long flights. With many warm regards, Lea""The German speaking Europe is now positive when it comes to assessment of vision in children with or without other impairments, screening is the big thing to discuss next. Now I should be able to set aside time to write all the instructions in German. Quite apparently I will not have any problems of spare time in this coming winter either. Have a nice week-end, Greetings, Lea"
"I send to you in this e-mail one MS and bring a longer one with me. I will appreciate your comments. This is written for the coming Textbook on Pediatric Eye Surgery. Since this is the first time eye surgeons have asked to hear anything about early intervention and rehabilitation I accepted the task even if I had my hands full with other things. Looking forward to seeing you soon, As ever, Lea"
"I had a good evening getting a CD to Warsava where I have course in June. They will write the Polish texts under the English texts so it will be easier to follow the lecture. Your CD got ready and then I checked three pictures that will be used in the Finnish Textbook on Gerontology. I wrote the chapter on Vision. I will try to translate it to English during the summer. During the coming week end I will try to make up my mind on the content of the LH Materials 2003. What if it would be two CDs? One with the materials of the 2001 and the second copies of PowerPoint lectures like the ones you now will get so that it would be even easier for people to lecture on children's vision. What do you think?
Greetings, Lea""We have a seminar for the early intervention workers in Russian Karelia at my summer house (because it did not look possible to organize it well in Petroskoi, Russia) and I have four lectures at the PanArabic and African Conference of Ophthalmology in Tunis, plus a festive lecture on macular degeneration at the celebration of the Year of the Handicapped in Espoo. With kind regards, Lea"
"We are starting a project to assess 100 children with CVI and to discuss the typical cases, case by case, in detail, describing the variation of symptoms and signs and offering a thorough discussion on how the information was used in special education, how we changed teaching plans and what the teachers thought about our suggestions during the whole process. Greetings, Lea"
"I have my ticket on the 2nd and should be in Rauma, Finland assessing multihandicapped children on the 4th and 5th, so it will be the smaller audience. We return from Hawaii on the morning of the 28th, …I could examine a few children. We need to take video recording of the examination so that we can analyze it afterwards with the child's parents, teachers and therapists, also the child's neurologist if possible... I could assess 3 children during that day…In Hawaii it would be really interesting to visit the School for deaf and deafblind, but where is it."
"Great news. AAPOS is interested in arranging a workshop on CVI, practical problems at the next meeting. That I would like to discuss with you to hear the perspective of vision teachers. Good night now, Lea"
"Thank you, Kathleen. I really want to give good teaching in Wyoming and have used a number of hours thinking on the contents of my speeches. If you have time, could you glance through the slides that I used in my Dortmund formal lecture…. I would like to preach more to the ophthalmologists. I preached recently to the Italian colleagues and will soon get that text on my homepage. I will let you know when that text is ready. Thanks again for clarifying the situation. Have a nice day. Lea"