Ask the Expert - Progressive Eye Center offers new technology to help children with learning difficulties

JONESBORO, Ark. (KAIT) - Progressive Eye Center recently won a national contest, securing funding for new RightEye Reading EyeQ equipment.

First Horizon Bank’s “Back to Business” contest was open to for-profit businesses in several states to enter. Out of the top 50 finalists for Arkansas, Progressive Eye Center received enough votes to win second place.

The second-place spot earned them $10,000 in prize money.

Dr. Jerry Ellis, the owner of Progressive Eye Center, used the money to buy RightEye Reading EyeQ equipment.

This equipment uses eye-tracking technology that can help an eyecare professional identify the root cause of reading problems in patients.

One out of every four children has an undetected vision problem that interferes with reading and

learning, and is often misinterpreted as disinterest, dyslexia, or ADHD. Some of the areas in

which this technology can help provide vital information to eye doctors includes:

Reading rate-words per minute read
Fixation span-how many characters are read during a single eye movement
Fixation time-how often a child’s eyes pause as they move along a line of text
Regressions-how many times a child rereads a line of text
Head tilt-an indicator that the eyes are not working together
Grade level comparison
Indicators for dry eye, eye teaming, fatigue, and other binocular issues
Average eye alignment while reading

The equipment is portable and will be rotated between the four Progressive Eye Center clinics in North Little Rock, Paragould, Cherokee Village, and Piggott.