Visiting Experts

Dr. Christine Roman-Lantzy

Cortical Visual Impairment Specialist

Dr. Christine Roman-Lantzy

Cortical Visual Impairment Specialist

Biography

Dr.Roman-Lantzy is the Director of The Pediatric View Program at The Western Pennsylvania Hospital in Pittsburgh, PA and a former Project Leader of the CVI Project at The American Printing House for the Blind in Louisville, KY.

Raised in Michigan, with degrees in Elementary Education and Special Education/Visual Impairment from the Michigan State University, Dr. Christine has worked as an itinerant teacher of the visually impaired in greater Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania area for 17 years prior to becoming a Research Assistant in the Vision Studies Program at the University of Pittsburgh. While at Pittsburgh, she completed her studies in Orientation & Mobility and received a Master’s Degree in Medically Fragile/High Risk Infants.

She also obtained her Ph.D. from Pittsburgh in 1996, where her dissertation on the Validation of an Interview Instrument to Identify Behaviors Characteristic of Cortical Visual Impairment in Infants revealed that caregivers of infants can reliably report regarding the presence or absence of the characteristics of CVI.

She has lectured extensively on the CVI educational materials she has developed. These materials include: The CVI Range an assessment of functional vision, and The CVI Resolution Chart & CVI/O&M Resolution Chart used to plot and monitor progress. Dr. Roman-Lantzy is the author of two books on CVI: Cortical Visual Impairment: Assessment and Intervention (now in its second edition) and Cortical Visual Impairment: Advanced Principles. She is also a board member of the Pediatric Cortical Visual Impairment Society.
Dr. Rosy-Mary Boustany

Neurogenetics & Development

Dr. Rosy-Mary Boustany

Neurogenetics & Development

Biography

Dr. Boustany directs the Neurogenetics Program and heads the Division of Pediatric Neurology and the AUBMC Special Kids Clinic at the American University of Beirut Medical Center, where she oversees basic research and academic clinical programs. Her research interests are Batten disease, lysosomal storage diseases, sphingolipids and their role in cell death, autism and breast cancer.

She specialized in Pediatric Neurology at Harvard Medical School, followed by a postdoctoral training in Neurogenetics / Neurochemistry after completing Medical Degree and Pediatric training at the American University of Beirut in 1980.

In 1985 she joined the Neurology faculty at MGH, and stayed on fo 4 years. During that time she was the Co-Director of the Lysosomal Storage Disease Laboratory at the Shriver Center for Mental Retardation.

Dr Boustany moved to Duke University in 1989, where she was on the faculty in Pediatrics and Medicine, and completed a fellowship in Molecular Biology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She became a full Professor in Pediatrics and Neurobiology in 2003. And established her research laboratory at Duke in 1992, which remained operational until December, 2007. In 2006 she moved to head the Abuhaidar Neuroscience Institute at the American University of Beirut, a position she held until July, 2009.
Judy Lariviere

Alternative & Augmentative Communication
(AAC) Consultant

Judy Lariviere

Alternative & Augmentative Communication
(AAC) Consultant

Biography

Judy Lariviere has 30 years of experience leveraging Assistive Technology, including Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC), for the benefit of children, teenagers, and young adults with Rett Syndrome (RTT) and related disorders.

In her work with youngsters with complex communication needs, Judy focuses on identifying their best means of access to technology for communication, literacy learning, and leisure.

Over the past 12 years, Judy has developed her own copyrighted eye gaze layouts specifically for individuals with RTT, as well as those with cortical visual impairment (CVI), to use on AAC devices that incorporate eye gaze technology. Some of the customized page sets she has created include a video player, accessible music player, life experience pages, control of smart speakers, books, alphabet books, and rhyming page sets. Judy has used her eye gaze trial page sets successfully in Tobii Dynavox’s Communicator 5 and Grid 3 with over 300 young children, teens, and adults with RTT, CDKL5, FOXG1, and MECP2 duplication.

Judy holds a Master’s degree in Educational Psychology with a concentration in Special Education.

Dr. Christine Roman-Lantzy

Dr. Christine Roman-Lantzy

Biography

Dr. Rosy-Mary Boustany

Dr. Rosy-Mary Boustany

Biography

Judy Lariviere

Judy Lariviere

Biography

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