dementia
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Researchers train AI to spot Alzheimer’s disease ahead of diagnosis
While Alzheimer's disease affects tens of millions of people worldwide, it remains difficult to detect early on. But researchers exploring whether AI can play a role in detecting Alzheimer's in patients are finding that it may be a valuable tool for helping spot the disease. Researchers in California recently published a study in the journal Radiology, and they demonstrated that, once trained, a neural network was able to accurately diagnose Alzheimer's disease in a small number of patients, and it did so based on brain scans taken years before those patients were actually diagnosed by physicians.
‘Sea Hero Quest’ hides dementia research inside a VR game
On the face of it, Sea Hero Quest could be just another mobile game. Cheerful, colorful and with plenty of bite-sized levels intended to test memory and spatial awareness. But while you're captaining your little boat along snaking channels towards checkpoints, the game is watching you. It's scoring your spatial navigation skill, one of the first innate abilities dementia sufferers experience a deterioration in. The data gathered is contributing towards a better understanding of what 'normal' looks like -- the benchmark for navigation skill across different demographics of people. The organizations behind the game are now back with a VR sequel, and the goal of advancing dementia research even further with their gamified approach.
Brains can recover some 'lost' memories
For the longest while, researchers believed that you could only preserve a memory in your brain if the relevant neurons were active. However, it now looks like this isn't always the case -- and that could be a tremendous help to anyone suffering from short-term memory loss. Scientists have discovered that small jolts of electricity to the brain (specifically, a pulse of transcranial magnetic stimulation) can revive recent memories. Your mind can slow near-term memories down to a dormant state where they're in the background, but remain ready to come back when necessary.
A truck touring the UK can give you a taste of dementia
They say that to truly understand other people, you need to put yourself in their shoes. The Mobile Virtual Dementia Tour does just that in order to give people the chance to know what it feels like to suffer from the condition. Training2Care, the UK-based care training provider that organized the tour, made the inside of a truck look like a person's home. Before you go in, you have to wear a pair of dark glasses that blurs everything and simulates macular degeneration, as well as headphones that reproduces what dementia patients hear: chaotic sounds and noise.
A game that explores the effects of Alzheimer's Disease
You're standing in a living room. It might be your living room. Something's not quite right -- for every object you recognize, there's another you don't. Normally, if you get this feeling while playing a video game, you're in the middle of a horror, awaiting the inevitable jump scare. In Forget-Me-Knot, however, you aren't evading an enemy, but instead trying to piece together memories of a life that, thanks to Alzheimer's Disease, you barely remember.
$17 million technology prize lets you choose which of humanity's problems to solve
Technology prizes are nothing new, but they tend to be focused on specific issues like space travel or security flaws. The upcoming Longitude Prize, funded by the Nesta charity and the UK government, will be a little more... ambitious. The duo is promising a £10 million ($17 million) reward for the best solution to one of six greater challenges that humanity faces today, such as developing eco-friendly flight or giving independence to the paralyzed. While the winning entry will have to help the British economy in some way, this is otherwise a truly global competition; anyone can enter, and the end result will ideally help the world at large.
Kinect and Unreal Engine 4 power Alzheimer's and dementia care project (video)
Sure, virtual reality and browser-based games are impressive, but Unreal Engine 4's latest use is a bit more noble: improving the lives of Alzheimer's and dementia patients. The Forest Project uses the game engine, smart TVs and Microsoft's Kinect 2 tech in an attempt to create a temporary reprieve for those suffering from the cognitive diseases via an interactive, virtual woodland. There's also a virtual dementia simulation that aims to help caregivers understand first-hand how their patients see the world, possibly improving care as a result. Should the dev team reach its crowdfunding goal, the arboreal environment could be just the beginning, with beach or Christmas-themed environments hinted as possible expansions. Opaque Multimedia and Alzheimer's Australia Vic need a fraction of what many modern game budgets command to bring The Forest Project to multiple platforms in early 2015 -- $82,000 (AU$90,000). Other details are scarce, but seeing that the team is in San Francisco for this week's Game Developer's Conference, we may hear more as the show progresses.
UK general practitioners use iPad to diagnose dementia
Macworld UK reports that some physicians in the UK are using an iPad-based app to help detect the early signs of dementia. The Guildford and Waverley Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) is promoting the use of the CANTABmobile system to help improve dementia diagnosis rates. CANTABmobile enables GPs to test a patient's episodic memory through an easy to use ten-minute cognitive assessment. Of the 21 GP practices in the Guildford and Waverley region, 19 have been provided with iPads and the software to assess patients who have concerns about their memory loss. A press release on the matter notes that the app is particularly useful in detecting signs of dementia when the early signs of memory loss are subtle and thus harder to diagnose with traditional cognitive testing. The application is based on neuropsychological tests conducted at Cambridge University and gives physicians access to testing methods that were previously only "available to pharmaceutical companies and academia for specialist trials and research." A video highlighting the benefits of the software can be seen below. The app is currently only available to healthcare providers in the UK. If you'd like to learn more about the app and the science behind it, the CANTABmobile website has a lot of interesting information worth looking over. It's worth noting that this isn't the first time we've seen the iPad being used to help physicians conduct medical testing. Back in April, for example, we reported that the FDA had given the green light to Vital Art and Science Inc. to market software which enables users with degenerative eye conditions to assess their condition, track disease progression and monitor any significant changes in visual function. The app is by no means a replacement for visiting the doctor, but provides patients with a means to more closely monitor their condition from home and alert a health care professional when something seems amiss.
Two days at E3 with a Vicon Revue life-blogging camera (video)
Each year the video gaming Mecca that is the Electronics Entertainment Expo seems to get a little more... stale. I've been attending since 1997, back when PC games dominated the show floor, scantily-clad mascots were everywhere, and press releases were handed out in three-ring binders. Despite the increasing sameness of it all it's still a huge privilege to go, an invitation I receive every summer and wish I could share with all my gamer friends -- which is, at this point, just about all of them. This year, thanks to Vicon, who kindly let me borrow one of its wearable Revue cameras, I can finally take you all along for the ride. %Gallery-96315%
Study finds casual gaming can help cognition
East Carolina University's Psychophysiology Lab recently published some promising findings from a study on the effect casual games can have on the cognitive abilities of older players. According to Gamasutra, the study, which has run for almost six months and counting, has measured certain mental functions of 40-some participants over the age of 50 as they've played various PopCap games in half-hour chunks over the duration of the study. Researchers have found that even this semi-regular play (like, really, who plays a PopCap game for just thirty minutes) has boosted participants' cognitive response times by 87 percent, in addition to increasing their executive functioning by a whopping 215 percent. So, what does that mean? The group conducting the study explained these findings could prove casual games (and, in all likelihood, "so-called 'hardcore' video games") could constitute effective mental exercise for the elderly, or those who suffer from dementia and Alzheimer's. That's really great news, since our grandmother has probably played enough Zuma that she can now move things around with her mind.
RFID network used in the fight against Alzheimer's
The problem with diagnosing Alzheimer's and other forms of dementia is that by the time someone presents symptoms, it is generally rather late in the game. Looking for a way to detect the affliction earlier on, researchers at the University of South Florida have developed a wireless network for use by senior living centers. Utilizing a series of receivers placed strategically around the building and RFID transponders worn on the wrists of patients, the system monitors people's walking patterns, looking for actions characteristic of cognitive decline -- including a tendency to wander, to veer suddenly, or to pause repeatedly. So far the study has found a statistical relationship between abnormal walking patterns and people for whom testing indicated dementia. The next step is to take that data and look for ways to predict the disease. Good luck, kids -- and hurry up. We ain't getting any younger 'round here.
Japanese doctors recommend Brain Training for seniors
Nintendo's line of brain-training games for the DS has found success among a wide range of ages in Japan, but its success with seniors has now been noted even among doctors and hospitals over there.According to the Associated Press, some hospitals have started placing DSes in waiting rooms and wards for patients. An administrator of a "memory loss clinic" in a Kyoto hospital said that doctors there have gone so far as to recommend the purchase of a DS and a game for elderly people to "stimulate their brains regularly at home," even watching patients play as an informal method of diagnosing dementia.Apparently, "Sony rushed out its own version of brain-training software in October but has yet to release sales figures." It's unlikely that the title could match the millions of units sold by its DS-based rival, but regardless of who's ahead, the gaming community should be pleased that 67-year-olds are now eager to "play a little everyday before going to bed," maybe even beating their grown-up children at the game someday.[Thanks, madgamer & samsoon; via Go Nintendo & GameDaily BIZ]
