(Press-News.org) A smartphone app can quickly screen for cognitive dysfunction often found in patients with cirrhosis, according to a new Virginia Commonwealth University study. The cognitive dysfunction, known as minimal hepatic encephalopathy (MHE), has been difficult to diagnose.
Published in the September issue of the journal Hepatology, the study tested the validity of the Stroop smartphone application – called EncephalApp_Stroop – as a method to screen for MHE.
Validation of the app as a health care tool opens the door for its use as a point-of-care (POC) instrument that providers can use to quickly, easily and confidently evaluate their patients who may be suffering from MHE.
"This app can be used to rapidly select which patients are likely to benefit from further MHE testing and potential treatment, which has been lacking at this time." said principal investigator Jasmohan Bajaj, M.D., associate professor, Department of Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition, VCU School of Medicine, who practices at VCU and McGuire VA Medical Centers. "It can be translated into practice by clinic assistants, nurses or other non-MD professionals to add a cost-effective approach to the rapid diagnosis of MHE."
MHE is associated with impaired quality of life, employment and driving capability and a higher risk of progression to overt hepatic encephalopathy, but treatment has not been standard of care in the U.S. partly because MHE testing is not feasible.
The free EncephalApp_Stroop app, which Bajaj developed, utilizes the Stroop task, which is used to evaluate psychomotor speed and cognitive flexibility through identification in various combinations of ink colors and words.
To determine the validity of the app as a health care tool, Bajaj and his team recruited 126 patients with cirrhosis, some of whom had overt hepatic encephalopathy, 51 age-balanced health controls and 43 additional patients with cirrhosis for the prospective validation cohort. They underwent a battery of recommended cognitive tests including the traditional MHE test and the Stroop app evaluation.
The team concluded that the Stroop app is a valid, reliable method for screening for MHE. Use of the app may improve the screening process by making it easier and faster and, subsequently, increase treatment rates in potential patients with MHE.
They suggest further studies evaluating the app's validity in other populations are needed.
The app can be downloaded on iTunes for iPhones or iPads and is available in Spanish, Czech, Slovak and Indonesian languages.
INFORMATION:
Smartphone app found to be valid tool in screening for minimal hepatic encephalopathy
2013-09-18
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
NASA's TRMM satellite and HS3 mission checking out Tropical Storm Humberto
2013-09-18
NASA's TRMM satellite watched Tropical Storm Humberto's rainfall pick up over two days as it re-formed, and as part of NASA's HS3 mission, two of NASA's Global Hawk unmanned aircraft have been investigating the zombie storm. The two Global Hawks also celebrated a combined 100 flights.
NASA's Global Hawk 871 departed from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility, Wallops Island, Va. today, Sept. 17, at 10 a.m. EDT from Runway 04. This marked the twenty-fifth flight for NASA 871. Meanwhile, NASA 872 was returning to home base after making its seventy-fifth flight. These flights ...
NASA's TRMM satellite animation gives flyby of Tropical Storm Ingrid's heavy rains
2013-09-18
VIDEO:
This 3-D flyby of Tropical Storm Ingrid's rainfall was created from TRMM satellite data for Sept. 16. Heaviest rainfall appears in red towers over the Gulf of Mexico, while moderate...
Click here for more information.
NASA's Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission satellite known as TRMM can compile the rain in which rain is falling as it orbits from space. When it passed over Tropical Storm Ingrid on Sept. 16 TRMM gathered data and it was used to create a NASA 3-D flyby ...
NASA's TRMM satellite adds up Tropical Storm Manuel's amazing rainfall
2013-09-18
Tropical Storm Manuel dropped very heavy rains that caused floods and mudslides and took lives on Mexico's Pacific coast. Manuel's rainfall was captured and tallied from NASA's Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission satellite known as TRMM.
Tropical storm Manuel may have dissipated, but the storm dropped very heavy rainfall along Mexico's Pacific coast where 21 people have been reported killed due to flooding and landslides caused by extreme rainfall. At the same time, on Sept. 16, Hurricane Ingrid weakened to a tropical storm and came ashore from the Gulf of Mexico into ...
Driving cessation hinders aging adults' volunteer and work lives, social lives okay in short term
2013-09-18
COLUMBIA, Mo. – For many senior drivers, it is only a matter of time before they are forced to give up their car keys due to failing eyesight or other health issues. Now, University of Missouri researchers have studied how aging adults' driving cessation influences their work and social lives. The researchers found that seniors' loss of driving independence negatively affected their ability to work and their volunteerism; the adults' social lives were not instantly affected yet dwindled over time.
"We found that seniors' productive engagement, such as paid work and formal ...
Proton weak charge determined for first time
2013-09-18
NEWPORT NEWS, VA, Sept. 17, 2013 – Researchers have made the first experimental determination of the weak charge of the proton in research carried out at the Department of Energy's Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility (Jefferson Lab).
The results, accepted for publication in Physical Review Letters, also include the determinations of the weak charge of the neutron, and of the up quark and down quark. These determinations were made by combining the new data with published data from other experiments. Although these preliminary figures are the most precise determinations ...
New muscular dystrophy treatment shows promise in early study led by Children's National
2013-09-18
WASHINGTON, DC — A preclinical study led by researchers at Children's National Medical Center has found that a new oral drug shows early promise for the treatment of Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD). The results, published in EMBO Molecular Medicine, show that the drug, VBP15, decreases inflammation and protects and strengthens muscle without the harsh side effects linked to current treatments with glucocorticoids such as prednisone.
Duchenne muscular dystrophy results in severe muscle degeneration and affects approximately 180,000 patients worldwide, mostly children. ...
Uncovering cancer's inner workings by capturing live images of growing tumors
2013-09-18
WASHINGTON, Sept. 17, 2013—Scientists seeking new ways to fight cancer often try to understand the subtle, often invisible, changes to DNA, proteins, cells, and tissue that alter the body's normal biology and cause disease. Now, to aid in that fight, a team of researchers has developed a sophisticated new optical imaging tool that enables scientists to look deep within tumors and uncover their inner workings. In experiments that will be described at Frontiers in Optics (FiO), The Optical Society's (OSA) Annual Meeting, Dai Fukumura and his colleagues will present new optical ...
New study shows solar manufacturing costs not driven primarily by labor
2013-09-18
Production scale, not lower labor costs, drives China's current advantage in manufacturing photovoltaic (PV) solar energy systems, according to a new report released today by the Energy Department's National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Although the prevailing belief is that low labor costs and direct government subsidies for PV manufacturing in China account for that country's dominance in PV manufacturing, the NREL/MIT study shows that a majority of the region's current competitive advantage comes from production ...
Innovative auto steering device could save lives
2013-09-18
It can take up to two and a half turns to steer a modern vehicle. While turning, the driver must release the wheel in the necessary hand-over-hand movement, which is unsafe. In his upcoming HFES 2013 Annual Meeting paper, Rene Guerster, who has been concerned with steering improvement since he was a child, proposes an alternative steering device that could help to prevent hazards such as rear-end collisions and rollovers caused by panic oversteering. He will present his work on October 4 at the Hilton San Diego Bayfront Hotel.
Severe sudden turns are extremely difficult ...
Neonatal livers better source for hepatocytes than adult livers
2013-09-18
Putnam Valley, NY. (Sept. 17, 2013) –A research team in Spain has developed high-yield preparations of viable hepatocytes (liver cells) isolated for transplantation from cryopreserved (frozen), banked neonatal livers that ranged in age from one day to 23 days. The researchers also assessed cell quality and function and found that neonatal hepatocytes show better thawing recovery than hepatocytes isolated from adult livers.
The study appears as an early e-publication for the journal Cell Transplantation, and is now freely available on-line at http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/cog/ct/pre-prints/content-cog_09636897_ct1036tolosa
"There ...