Poster Presentations

Session Title: Alzheimer's Disease (AD) including Non-Cognitive Aspects
Presentation Date: Friday, March 14 – Saturday, March 15, 2009

IMPROVING SHORT-TERM MEMORY LOSS IN PATIENTS WITH ALZHEIMER'S DEMENTIA USING SMARTPHONE APPLICATION FOR CAPTURING DAILY LIFE MOMENTS

P. Battagiri¹, G. Deleo^2
1Old Dominion University, Electrical Engineering, Norfolk, United States, ²Old Dominion University, College of Health Sciences, Norfolk, United States

People with Alzheimer's Dementia suffer from confusion, disorganized thinking, impaired judgment, trouble in expressing themselves and disorientation. In most of the patients, these patterns result in short-term memory loss. Previous research studies determined that external aids can be used to recall the past memories, thus improving the quality of life of the people with Alzheimer's Dementia. Since, short-term memory is rich with visions; reviewing images of previous experiences should be helpful in recollecting memories of past life. In this research study, everyday activities are captured with a smart phone worn by the patient with a lanyard. The smart phone will be programmed to take a picture, for every five minutes. These pictures are uploaded to a remote and secure server through the Internet connection available on the smart phone. This is a continuous and automatic process without any involvement or conscious of the patients. The images received will be combined in a slide show and stored into a DVD and mailed to the patient's home once in a week, so that they can be viewed. Caregivers are asked to review the slide show together with the patients. Caregivers will also collect structured data by using a standardized questionnaire. From the data collected, this study is to determine if the consistent review of earlier events with pictures helps the patient in arousing the memories of past experiences. The project also aims to investigate if the images collected through the smart phone form a complete and rational collection of past events.