Awardee Organization(s): Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center
Principal Investigator(s): Chun Lim, MD, PhD
Official Project Title: Mobile Technology as a Cognitive Biomarker of Alzheimer’s Disease
AITC Partner: PennAITech
Website(s):
https://www.bidmc.org/
https://bidmcneurology.org/
Alzheimer’s disease’s hallmark is insidious memory loss often accompanied by a lack of awareness of the deficit. Its diagnosis requires evidence of cognitive impairment and remains reliant on clinical assessments, primarily traditional pen and paper cognitive tasks, which, with its many limitations results in only one-half of patients ever diagnosed by physicians. Thus, a simple, inexpensive, and at-home method to capture more of these patients earlier in their disease process could facilitate earlier therapy and planning.
We propose to modernize the clinical diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease by taking advantage of smartphones to collect multiple streams of behavioral information including active data such as reaction/response time to cognitive tasks and games as well as data captured passively on the smartphone such as movement, location, and typing speed. Using advanced analytical tools, we propose to develop a new smartphone-based app for use in the home environment that detect signs and symptoms of early cognitive impairment and to continuously monitor for progression by capturing passive, real-world information, and active data.