A study of vestibular function in children with learning disabilities
Abstract
Specific Learning Disabilities (SLD) are a group of neurodevelopmental disorders that can significantly hamper a person’s ability to acquire new knowledge. Objective: to diagnose the existence of vestibular dysfunction in children with SLD as an underlying hidden factor that might be a risk factor for this disorder. This study included 25 children diagnosed by Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition(DSM-5) as SLD children, and 25 age- and sex-matched healthy controls. Participants underwent comprehensive audiological evaluation, psycholinguistic testing The Illinois Test of Psycholinguistic Abilities (ITPA), Stanford-Binet-5, and paediatric vestibular assessment including, office vestibular tests, Vestibular Evoked Myogenic Potentials (VEMPs), and rotatory chair testing. Exclusion criteria included any kind of hearing loss, refractive errors, neurological disorders, IQ < 70, and serious illness. Children with SLDs showed significant deficits across most Illinois Test subtests and cVEMPs and oVEMPs revealed reduced wave detectability. Lower P1–N1 peak to peak amplitudes in both cVEMPs and oVEMPs, and prolonged P1-N1 interpeak latency in cVEMPs test were reported in the SLD group. On the other hand, rotatory chair and bedside vestibular tests showed no differences except for increased saccade latency in SLDs. Strong positive correlations were found between VEMPs peak to peak amplitudes and Illinois scores. On the other hand, cVEMPs P1–N1 interpeak latency, and saccade latency were negatively correlated with Illinois score. These findings indicate that vestibular dysfunction, particularly of the otolith organs, is common in children in the study group. Within this study, vestibular abnormalities especially those affecting otolith-related measures were observed in children with specific learning disorders (SLDs), and these abnormalities showed correlations with psycholinguistic performance. While these findings contribute to the emerging evidence regarding vestibular dysfunction in SLDs, further research with larger samples is required to establish their consistency and clinical relevance. Not applicable.