Kindle cover to help people with dyslexia

An inventor has come up with a cover for Amazon's Kindle that has a coloured overlay that will help some people who are dyslexic or have visual impairments use these ebook readers.

John Hampton, the developer of the ReadRight cover, said coloured overlays and tinted glasses have been proven to work on hard copy books but he felt there was a "gap in the market".

"I discovered that there was nothing like ReadRight available for people with visual impairments, like dyslexia, who want to use electronic reading devices."

Although it is not known why using colour helps many people read better, research has found that for people with some forms of dyslexia and other visual impairments, the improvement is enormous.

In 2003 Professor Arnold Wilkens carried out studies into visual stress and discovered that tinted glasses or overlays were extremely effective.

His paper, Reading through Colour, concluded that "At least five per cent of the school population reads considerably faster with an overlay, and 20 per cent benefit to a lesser extent."

The ReadRight's colour screen changes the background colour, for example to black text on a yellow background. Because it known that each person has a different colour preference, the overlays are available in three colours, so users can select the one that best suits them.

The ReadRight cover has just gone on sale at Amazon, priced at £12.99