Electrical stimulation may serve to treat a variety of brain-related conditions, and there are already a number of products that help to control Parkinson’s, essential tremor, addiction, and depression. Though there’s a considerable ongoing progress, most of the currently available technologies are not very smart and certainly can&rsquo (Read more...)
Tag: Psychiatry
Transcranial Magnetic Brain Stimulation to Treat Depression and OCD: Interview with Stanford’s Dr. Nolan Williams
Chances are, someone you know has been affected by mental health problems. With an estimated world-wide burden of 300 million people, depression can be a severely debilitating condition. In fact, in the past year alone, more than 16 million adults in the US have experienced a major depressive episode. While many of those who seek help [&hellip (Read more...)
Edge Headset for Enhanced Learning and Memory: Interview with Dr. Tim Fiori, Co-founder of HUMM
HUMM, a San Francisco-based tech company, has developed the Edge headset, a wearable electrical stimulation device that the company claims can boost learning and memory. The device consists of a headband that delivers electrical stimulation to the brain, and using it for just 15 minutes is reported to provide certain cognitive enhancements for at l (Read more...)
Mental Illness Body Tracker Accurately Diagnoses PTSD
Mental illness can be notoriously difficult to diagnose in many cases, since symptoms may be invisible to physicians and those that are can be misleading. Objective methods that don’t rely on a direct observation would help to improve diagnosis. Researchers at Draper, the famous engineering firm in Cambridge, Massachusetts, have developed a s (Read more...)
Cataract Surgery, Hearing Aids May Curb Cognitive Decline
Sensory deprivation is a risk factor for cognitive decline and dementia, but will correcting impaired hearing and vision prevent these outcomes? Yes, these studies suggest. Medscape Medical News
Glasses with Green Lenses Help Kids with Dyslexia to Read
Researchers at the São Paulo State University in Brazil and Paris Diderot University in France have for the first time conclusively showed that green light filter can help children overcome symptoms of dyslexia. Specifically, nine and ten year-old children with dyslexia improved their reading time significantly when using green col (Read more...)
Ohio State Studying Medical Aspects of Video Games in New Esports Program
At Ohio State University there’s a new program to study various aspects of esports (competitive playing of video games), including medically related issues such as fatigue, long-term problems for players, and how the brain and muscles work together to achieve incredible feats of coordination. The Sports Medicine Movement Analysis and Performa (Read more...)
Feed.fm Brings Music to Mobile Health with Launch of Health.fm: Interview with CEO Jeff Yasuda
Studies have shown that listening to music can have clinically-beneficial side effects from lowering cortisol hormone levels that cause stress and anxiety to correlating highly with verbal memory improvement in stroke patients when compared to patients not listening to music. Seeking to leverage its existing music expertise and enter the mobile hea (Read more...)
Vuzix Smart Glasses and Genzõ App Provide Live Life Experiences for Low-Mobility Patients
Vuzix, a New York-based supplier of smart glasses and augmented reality solutions, has partnered with 1Minuut Innovation, a Dutch healthcare innovation company, to provide a real-time life experience solution for low-mobility patients. The system consists of the Vuzix M300 smart glasses and the 1Minuut Genzõ app, and it allows patients who a (Read more...)
Face and Voice Recognition Identifies Dementia Sufferers
Dementia can creep on slowly and develop without much notice in many patients. Monitoring these changes is not easy, typically requiring professional experts to interpret faint symptoms gauged through standard questionnaires. Patients undergoing such testing tend to get used to it and end up improving their test taking ability, skewing the results. (Read more...)
dayzz, An Evidence-Based, Personalized Sleep Training App for Employers, Interview with CEO Amir Inditzky
In addition to fatigue, high blood pressure, and weight gain experienced by individuals with chronically poor sleep, productivity and performance in the workplace are also known to suffer. Sleep deprivation, for example, can cost employers up to six lost working days and $2,762 in financial impact annually per employee. Today, the American Academy (Read more...)
iPrognosis Looking at People’s Behaviors to Find Signs of Parkinson’s
Our smartphones are powerful sensors and information processors that have the potential to detect early signs of some diseases. Parkinson’s, for example, is a disease that can have a slow onset with few symptoms early on. These symptoms, moreover, may be unnoticeable to the person and those around them, but possibly detectable by the phone. [ (Read more...)
Draper’s Wireless Brain Implant to Make New Therapies Possible
Draper, an engineering firm in Cambridge, MA, has developed a tiny wireless neuromodulation device that may be small enough to implant into the interior of the cranium right against the brain. Current brain stimulators are placed, like pacemakers, under the skin in the chest, with electric leads reaching out through the vasculature into the brain. (Read more...)
Multimedia Experience to Help Alzheimer’s Patients Connect
People with advanced Alzheimer’s disease have a serious difficulty connecting to the real world. Gabriela Gomes, a graduate of University of South California’s School of Cinematic Arts, has created a unique experience-based digital solution that takes Alzheimer’s patients to a comforting place they may recognize and enjo (Read more...)
Eye Test to Detect Alzheimer’s Disease Before Symptoms Start
At Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis researchers may have spotted signs of Alzheimer’s disease within patient eyes, potentially leading to a non-invasive and rapid test for the disease. “This technique has great potential to become a screening tool that helps decide who should undergo more expensive and invasive (Read more...)
Vagus Nerve Stimulation Highly Effective at Treating Drug Resistant Depression
Drugs have been the go-to therapy for psychiatrists treating depression, but implantable neurostimulators have been making substantial impact lately. A national study headed by a team from Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis wanted to find out how well this drug-free technique can control serious depression. The team evaluated abo (Read more...)
Brainsway Transcranial Stimulation Cleared in U.S. for Obsessive Compulsive Disorder
Brainsway, Israel’s leading magnetic stimulation company, won FDA de novo clearance for its system to be used to treat obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) in the United States. The company’s Deep Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation system is used to deliver magnetic field pulses to the front of the brain, altering brain activity in t (Read more...)
Light Therapy Tech to Help Overcome Jet Lag and Summer Insomnia
The warm summer months we’re experiencing here in the northern hemisphere bring a whole host of health effects on our bodies. While longer days in the sun allow more time for our bodies to produce vitamin D and develop a nice tan, too much sun can lead to painful sunburns, an increased risk of skin […]
IntelliSense Virtual Reality Mindfulness Trainer: Medgadget Review
Stress is killing us. Daily demands and pressures all too often preoccupy our thoughts, leaving us feeling overwhelmed and exhausted. Recent clinical data suggest that more than 70 percent of American adults regularly experience psychological and physical symptoms caused by stress, which include fatigue, headaches, muscle tension, and irritability. (Read more...)
Humanoid Robot Teaches Autistic Kids to Recognize Emotions
Children with autism often seem to want to socialize with robots more than humans, something that researchers at MIT want to harness as a pathway for therapy. The team, partnering with others at Chubu University in Japan and Imperial College London, have given a popular humanoid robot, called NAO, the ability to see what the kids […]