Author: Alvaro Fernandez

Let me now share what the Judging Panel and the SharpBrains team found most impressive from each Winner and Finalist of the 2010 Brain Fitness Innovation Awards, accompanied by some additional information on each of these 10 noteworthy initiatives and case studies.

Grand Prize Winner

USA Hockey, Inc., is the National Governing Body of the sport of ice hockey in the United States. With a membership of nearly 600,000 players, coaches, officials and volunteers that span all 50 states, USA Hockey seeks to promote the growth of hockey and provide the best possible experience for all participants by encouraging, developing, advancing and administering the sport.

Project Scope: The National Team Development Program (NTDP), a USA Hockey body, is a full-time development program aimed at preparing under-18 student-athletes for participation on US National Teams. Its efforts focus both on high-caliber participation on the ice and individual skill development. The program is composed of two squads: the US National Under-18 and Under-17 Teams.

During the past hockey season, the NTDP implemented a cognitive training system designed to help hockey players develop perception and decision-making skills called The Hockey IntelliGym. Designed to enhance ‘Hockey Sense’—or the way players gather information from their surroundings, make and execute decisions—The Hockey IntelliGym training system utilizes a software-based training environment with customized algorithms that adjust training programs to individual players according to ability and progress. Players engaged in a twice-a-week cognitive training regimen that became an integral part of their overall training program during which time cognitive scientists monitored players’ performance and provided coaching staff with analyses and progress reports. Among statistical figures measured, the most notable was the win ratio of teams involved, as IntelliGym trained team won more games.

The IntelliGym program took more than two years and $2 million to put together with the collaboration of Applied Cognitive Engineering (ACE) and was enabled by a grant from the BIRD Foundation who scientifically reviewed the plan and financially supported it.

Project Leader: Scott Monaghan, Director of Operations, USA Hockey National Team Development Program

Selected comments by Judging Panel: Excellent team approach between specialist, coach and player. Great concept and need, and  insights/model could apply very broadly to skill development. The adaptation of cognitive training to this particular sports domain is clever and can be generalized to a wide range of other activities. I was impressed with the USA Hockey National Team Development Program and their Hockey Intelligym. To develop/adapt such a program and clearly demonstrate it’s impact on real-life performance, is fantastic. There is also a great opportunity to expand this to even more athletes and sports and to everyday life.

Silver Prize Winners

Allstate (NYSE: ALL) is the nation’s largest publicly held personal lines insurer. Allstate is reinventing protection and retirement to help individuals in approximately 17 million households protect what they have today and better prepare for tomorrow.

Project Scope: Allstate embarked on a journey with Posit Science Corporation to evaluate the interest in and effectiveness of Posit Science’s software—leveraging technology shown in National Institutes of Health funded studies to improve visual processing skills important for safe driving—to test a software program (Insight) in Pennsylvania. Selected drivers, 50 years and older, were invited to help validate the impact cognitive training has on driving safety.

The project was a “proof of concept” for what may turn out to be a significant effort by Allstate to prevent injuries and save lives, enable older people to maintain their independence longer and provide peace of mind to adult children faced with difficult decisions as parents age. The most important reduction was in insured losses and resulting injuries, trauma and disruption to the lives of those involved in auto collisions. After observing the accident behavior of those who completed the Posit program, relative to a well selected control group, Allstate saw a measurable decline that was statistically valid.

Project Leader: Tom Warden, Assistant Vice President, Allstate Research and Planning Center

Selected comments by Judging Panel: The potential impact of this program is second to none. I was impressed with Allstate’s project and their results that showed that the Posit Science software positively impacted the accident records of those completing the program. Allstate should be commended for trying something new and different and for creating such an initiative. Pretty soon I can imagine brain fitness discounts alongside safe driver and other discounts.

Nationwide, based in Columbus, Ohio, is one of the largest and strongest diversified insurance and financial services organizations in the U.S. and is rated A+ by A.M. Best. The company provides a full range of personalized insurance and financial services, including including auto and life insurance, pensions, health and productivity services, and more.

Project Scope: Nationwide Mutual Insurance worked with benefits provider OptumHealth and their partner Brain Resource to add a Web based brain training tool (MyBrainSolutions) to help employees enhance positivity, emotional resilience and deal with others more effectively — all key elements to productivity. More than 500 employees enrolled in the company’s ‘Healthy Holiday Challenge’ during the first week. The results of the new resource led to more positive behavior changes and greater productivity among the workforce.

As part of the MyBrainSolutions launch, associates were asked to register, take a baseline brain assessment, accumulate a target number of points during a 30-day period and then take a second brain assessment. The company found that aspects of positivity, emotional resilience and social skills improved in the short 6-week initiative and saw small changes in productivity were noticeable as well. 87% of those participating in the program indicated they were planning to take additional steps to improve health after participating while 33.5% wouldn’t have accessed other resources to address health and wellbeing if it weren’t for the initiative.

Project Leader: Kathleen Herath, AVP Health & Productivity

Selected comments by Judging Panel: Harvard Business Review estimated a couple years ago that $150B is lost annually as a result of lost employee productiity. Given all of the life events and transitions that individuals experience each year that can distract, this provides a feasible and attractive lever for employees to take advantage of. Employers of the future that can implement innovative models such as these to adapt to the changing needs of employees, enhance employee productivity, and help to redefine what work means by infusing the professional with the personal will win, and have as a reward loyal employees, a happy culture, and an overall higher performing workforce. The positive self-report measures were impressive as well as the improvements in such a short period of time. Seems to have potential for replicability with scalable, low-cost programs. In principle this approach could have large societal benefits. Implementing cognitive training in a work place is novel and taps into the desire to optimize professional functioning as well as stave off decline.  The emotional and self-regulation training is extremely important in the workplace setting.

Rest of Top 10 Finalists

(Note: out of the 40 organizations that submitted entries to the inaugural 2010 Brain Fitness Innovation Awards, 10 became Top 10 Finalists. Here we want to recognize the organizations which, while not winning the overall contest, did impress the judging panel with the quality of their ongoing initiatives. They are ordered by the approximate age of their end user population, from younger to older:

Most Innovative Special Ed School

Arrowsmith School offers a comprehensive suite of cognitive programs for students with learning disabilities, targeting 19 areas of the brain most commonly involved in learning. The Arrowsmith Program, which originated in Toronto, is now offered in schools in Canada and the US.

Project Scope: Help remediate Learning Disabilities by developing and implementing a proprietary suite of neuroplasticity-based exercises in 3 formats: computer-based, auditory, pen and paper.

• Project Leader: Barbara Arrowsmith, Director
• Selected Comments by Judging Panel:  How easy would it be to say “they’s not smart enough” or “they’re making excuses”, instead of “they have a cognitive shortcoming that can be addressed.” The target audience of 5-10% of school children with learning disabilities can now have a fighting chance if models like these can be scaled through policy and/or replication. This gets my vote as the model creates almost immeasurable lifetime impact for those fortunate enough to be reap all the cognitive benefits of the program. Arrowsmith efforts since 1979 puts them in a class of their own as pioneers. Arrowsmith also has a process learning from and refining its initiatives. Program can be built further on very solid foundations.

Most Innovative Behavioral Health Provider

University Behavioral HealthCare (UBHC) was established in 1971 as a division of the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ) and is one of the largest providers of behavioral healthcare services in the country.

Project Scope: Remediate cognitive impairments associated with severe mental illness by developing and implementing an innovative curriculum and proprietary manual for cognitive rehab support groups, combining best of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, cognitive training, and social skills training.

• Project Leader: Steven M. Silverstein, Ph.D., Director, Division of Schizophrenia Research & Director of Research
• Selected Comments by Judging Panel: Noteworthy person-centered approach, focused on how to impact quality of life with self-empowerment tools and social support.

Most Innovative Foundation

The AAA Foundation for Traffic Safetyhas a mission to identify problems, foster research that seeks solutions, and disseminate information and educational materials that promote good safety practices.

Project Scope: Improve driving safety among older adults by  promoting and testing visual processing training program InSight by Posit Science.

• Project Leader: Peter Kissinger, President and CEO
• Selected Comments by Judging Panel: Very high quality program Innovative. Eminently scalable. Benefits users, AAA, and community at large – very good synergy.This approach grounds cognitive training in an activity that for many is critical to independence. The tie to insurance will motivate the training which may increase road safety and have broader benefits for cognitive health.

Most Innovative Hospital

Saint Luke’s Brain and Stroke Institute, part of Saint Luke’s Health System in Kansas and Missouri, covers the entire spectrum of care including acute intervention, prevention of complications, secondary prevention and neurorehabilitation.

Project Scope: Help extend healthy independent living and address cognitive impairments by making accessible a Brain Fitness Center that combines education, assessments, lifestyle advice and targeted neurocognitive and mindfulness-based training.

• Project Leader: John Corbaley, M.S., M.A., CCC/Sp., Director, Brain Fitness Center, Saint Luke’s Hospital of Kansas City
• Selected Comments by Judging Panel: Saint Luke’s program was impressive in a number of ways. I liked that they worked with multiple discplines to create a holistic program focused on improved brain health through cognitive training, nutrition and exercise as well as other activities. It is no surprise that they have a wait list of users eager to join their program.

Most Innovative Adult Education

Oakland Unified School District has a mission to ensure that all students graduate as caring, competent, and critical thinkers, as well as fully-informed, engaged, and contributing citizens, prepared to succeed in college and career. Adult and Career Education services empower adults through through education and training.

Project Scope: Extend healthy independent living (for new pilot: improve academic success among at-risk students) by offering a Brain Fitness Class that combines curriculum, discussions and computerized cognitive training (by Posit Science, for older adults; by Lumos Labs, for new pilot with young adults).

• Project Leader: Teri Barr, Brain Health Program Coordinator
• Selected Comments by Judging Panel: Strong approach to overcome some of the age boundaries among targeted populations. What I love the most about this wonderful success story is how this program has been able to appeal to individuals across socio-economic, demographic, and educational backgrounds, and in the process deliver both real and perceived value. One way I think it has done this is through presenting a multi-faceted value proposition (i.e., build cognitive health + build community + have fun in the process) in a single setting. Lessons learned were also very well articulated, and the approach of combining high-tech with high-touch I thought was ingenious and realistic given the context.

Most Innovative Mental Health Association

The Mental Health Association of Rockland County, in New York State, is a non-profit organization with a mission to prevent mental illness and foster mental wellness through community outreach, direct service and advocacy for legislation and programs.

Project Scope: Extend healthy independent living by offering a cognitive health series of live events to engage the community with a stigma-free, proactive brain fitness message, supported by professional training, socialization platforms and cognitive training (by CogniFit).

• Project Leader: Karen Oates, Director
• Selected Comments by Judging Panel: So great to see a Mental Health Association promoting this important project and allying with so many groups and organizations, including CogniFit, in doing so. Great that they have been able to overcome the stigma so often associated with aging and mental fitness through the project. With the manual and pamphlet, there are excellent replication possibilities.

Most Innovative Health Plan

SCAN Health Plan has been focusing for more than 30 years on the unique needs of people with Medicare and is now the country’s fourth largest not-for-profit Medicare Advantage plan. The company currently has nearly 120,000 members in California and Arizona.

Project Scope: Extend healthy independent living by developing the concept of a “SCAN Van” to deliver health screenings & education combined with physical and cognitive exercise (Wii gaming; touch screen-based cognitive training by HappyNeuron) in places where seniors gather.

• Project Leader: Lena Perelman, Director of Community Outreach
• Selected Comments by Judging Panel: A clever plan for the delivery of cognitive exercises. SCAN’s is innovative not only because its mobile but because it presents a more holistic approach to brain health with its “multi-pronged” program.

Here you can learn more about the 2010 Brain Fitness Innovation Awards.

Please join us in congratulating USA Hockey, Allstate, and Nationwide, for reaching the podium of the 2010 Brain Fitness Innovation Awards, unveiled today.

The podium’s top position went to USA Hockey National Team Development Program (NTDP), a full-time development program aimed at preparing student-athletes for participation on the US National Under-18 and Under-17 Teams, for its innovative cognitive training system designed with the help of Applied Cognitive Engineering (ACE) and the BIRD Foundation to help hockey players develop perception and decision-making skills. More than two years in the making and $2 million to produce, the Hockey IntelliGym offers players a video-game-like training environment to enhance ‘hockey-sense’-the information gathered from surroundings to make and execute playing decisions on-ice. According to statistics, IntelliGym training helped NTDP teams win more games than non-trained teams.

Judges selected the entry for its inspiring team approach-an intersection between specialist, coach and player. To adapt such a program and demonstrate its impact on real-life performance, they felt, opened new opportunities for extension to other sports and everyday life.

“We’re extremely honored that the Hockey IntelliGym is being recognized with this prestigious award,” said Dave Ogrean, executive director of USA Hockey. “Together with ACE and the BIRD Foundation, we’re proud to have developed what is a truly innovative training product that helps enhance the decision-making skills of our athletes.”

Entries from Allstate and Nationwide Mutual Insurance rounded out the competition’s other top-performers. Nationwide Mutual Insurance’s ‘Healthy Holiday Challenge’ offered a Web based tool-MyBrainSolutions-to help employees enhance positivity, emotional resilience and deal with others more effectively – all key elements to productivity. In Pennsylvania, Allstate invited selected drivers, 50 years and older, to help validate the impact targeted cognitive training such as Posit Science InSight can have on driving safety in an effort to prevent injuries, save lives, enable older people to maintain their independence longer and provide peace of mind to adult children faced with difficult decisions as parents age.

The remaining Top 10 Finalists included (in alphabetical order):

• AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety
• Arrowsmith School
• Mental Health Association of Rockland County
• Oakland Unified School District
• Saint Luke’s Brain and Stroke Institute
• SCAN Health Plan
• University Behavioral HealthCare

In its first year, the competition showed considerable promise with 40 entries from prestigious organizations and companies around the world. “We’re delighted to have so many entries which showcase that brain fitness is for everyone at any age,” said SharpBrains’ CEO and Co-Founder Alvaro Fernandez. “The brain fitness field is still in its infancy but given today’s longer life spans and the accompanying desire to make those years healthy and productive, we believe it’s important to recognize those organizations pioneering the way and adding to collective learning.”

-> To learn more about the Innovation Awards, click Here.
-> To download full Press Kit, click Here (includes logos, FAQ, initiative descriptions, PR contacts).

A full 200+ page market report detailing all ten finalist case studies in the context of overall research and market trends will be available next month.

Press contact:
Rebecca Brink
PR Rep – SharpBrains
rebecca at brinkconsulting dot biz

About SharpBrains and the Brain Fitness Innovation Awards

SharpBrains is an independent market research firm covering the emerging brain fitness and cognitive health market. Its flagship industry report The State of the Brain Fitness Software Market and consumer guide The SharpBrains Guide to Brain Fitness help decision makers and consumers navigate the emerging brain fitness field based on evidence-based information and independent analysis. The organization also hosts the 3-day online global and virtual SharpBrains Summit, a first of its kind conference, engaging professionals across the globe on the state of cognitive fitness research, technology and market trends. SharpBrains.com, the firm’s educational blog and website, is a member of the Scientific American Partner Network.

Designed to foster innovation and best practice sharing, the Awards celebrate outstanding pioneers applying neuroplasticity-based research and tools in the ‘real world’. Put on by independent market research firm SharpBrains of San Francisco, the Awards recognize organizations devising and implementing results-oriented, scalable initiatives demonstrating commitment to the brain fitness of organization clients, members, patients, students or employees-and showcase innovative uses of non-invasive tools to improve cognitive and emotional functions.

Important reminder: members of the Judging Panel will recognize the Finalists and the 3 Winners in an Awards Ceremony Call on Monday, noon-1pm Pacific Time.

In order to participate in the call:

• Members of the Press can register, free: Here (serious bloggers can apply too)
• Anyone else can register ($25): Here

Out of the 40 organizations that submitted entries to the inaugural 2010 Brain Fitness Innovation Awards, the 10 Finalists (ordered by approximate age of end user population, from younger to older) are:

Arrowsmith School offers a comprehensive suite of cognitive programs for students with learning disabilities, targeting 19 areas of the brain most commonly involved in learning. The Arrowsmith Program, which originated in Toronto, is now offered in schools in Canada and the US.

USA Hockey, Inc., is the National Governing Body of the sport of ice hockey in the United States. With a membership of nearly 600,000 players, coaches, officials and volunteers that span all 50 states, USA Hockey seeks to promote the growth of hockey and provide the best possible experience for all participants by encouraging, developing, advancing and administering the sport.

Nationwide, based in Columbus, Ohio, is one of the largest and strongest diversified insurance and financial services organizations in the U.S. and is rated A+ by A.M. Best. The company provides a full range of personalized insurance and financial services, including including auto and life insurance, pensions, health and productivity services, and more.

University Behavioral HealthCare (UBHC) was established in 1971 as a division of the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ) and is one of the largest providers of behavioral healthcare services in the country.

Allstate (NYSE: ALL) is the nation’s largest publicly held personal lines insurer. Allstate is reinventing protection and retirement to help individuals in approximately 17 million households protect what they have today and better prepare for tomorrow.

The AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety has a mission to identify problems, foster research that seeks solutions, and disseminate information and educational materials that promote good safety practices.

Saint Luke’s Brain and Stroke Institute, part of Saint Luke’s Health System in Kansas and Missouri, covers the entire spectrum of care including acute intervention, prevention of complications, secondary prevention and neurorehabilitation.

Oakland Unified School District has a mission to ensure that all students graduate as caring, competent, and critical thinkers, as well as fully-informed, engaged, and contributing citizens, prepared to succeed in college and career. Adult and Career Education services empower adults through through education and training.

The Mental Health Association of Rockland County, in New York State, is a non-profit organization with a mission to prevent mental illness and foster mental wellness through community outreach, direct service and advocacy for legislation and programs.

SCAN Health Plan has been focusing for more than 30 years on the unique needs of people with Medicare and is now the country’s fourth largest not-for-profit Medicare Advantage plan. The company currently has nearly 120,000 members in California and Arizona.

What are these organizations doing in order to be recognized as Finalists of the 2010 Brain Fitness Innovation Awards? Which among them will be the 3 Winners? Stay tuned…answers on Monday.

Now that we are preparing our 2010 market report we are analyzing in depth a number of important recent developments. A major one, whose implications haven’t yet been properly digested, was the publication in the UK of a fantastic series of policy, scientific and technology reports by the Foresight Project on Mental Capital and Wellbeing. If you want to have a stimulating and substantial read, you can download the Executive Summary (and most other reports) for free.

I was thinking about their main recommendation (the need to focus more attention, as a society and as individuals, on building mental capital and wellbeing trajectories along the lifecourse), as I came across these apparently completely separate news. Doesn’t the lifelong mental capital framework add new light on these articles?

Study Sees Gains In Good Child Care (Wall Street Journal)

A study released Friday found that benefits associated with child-care providers and preschool programs that encourage such activities as language, reading and game-playing last well into adolescence. In particular, teenagers who had such child-care performed significantly better academically than those given low-quality or no care outside the home.

High-quality care was defined as an environment in which care-givers or teachers were warm, engaged and sensitive to a child’s needs, and provided cognitive stimulation through activities that would promote language, such as reading, conversation and game-playing.

Time to Review Workplace Reviews? (New York Times)

The focus on workplace health comes as worker satisfaction in the United States appears to be at an all-time low. The Conference Board reported recently that just 45 percent of workers are satisfied with their jobs, down from 61 percent in 1987. The findings, based on a survey of 5,000 households, show that the decline goes well beyond concerns about job security. Employees are unhappy about the design of their jobs, the health of their organizations and the quality of their managers.

Dr. Sutton, whose new book “Good Boss, Bad Boss” (coming from Business Plus) argues that good bosses are essential to workplace success, said skyrocketing health care costs should motivate businesses to focus on ways to lower stress.

Alzheimer’s Prevention or Cognitive Enhancement (blog post based on NIH independent panel)

“Firm conclusions cannot be drawn about the association of modifiable risk factors with cognitive decline or Alzheimer’s disease.”

(Note: which is true, but, as we discussed previously, this is being misunderstood to mean “there is nothing we can do to maintain if not enhance our cognitive and self-regulation capacities,” which couldn’t be further from truth, based on the very simple facts of lifelong neurogenesis and neuroplasticity.)

An independent expert panel organized by the NIH released yesterday a thoughtful report on the state of the science for prevention of Alzheimer’s Disease and cognitive decline. The report, available here, summarizes the panel’s review by saying:

• “Firm conclusions cannot be drawn about the association of modifiable risk factors with cognitive decline or Alzheimer’s disease.”
• “There is insufficient evidence to support the use of pharmaceutical agents or dietary supplements to prevent cognitive decline or Alzheimer’s disease. However, ongoing additional studies including (but not limited to) antihypertensive medications, omega-3 fatty acid, physical activity, and cognitive engagement may provide new insight into the prevention or delay of cognitive decline or Alzheimer’s disease.”

To put findings in perspective, let me suggest our article Brain maintenance: it’s about cognitive enhancement first, Alzheimer’s delay second. Before people get scared away by the sentence “there is nothing we know of that can prevent Alzheimer’s Disease”, everyone should understand that this is true but different from saying “there is nothing we can do to reduce the probability from developing AD symptoms” or “there is nothing we can do today to enhance our cognitive functions today and tomorrow” (both areas with solid research and useful guidelines and tools). I gave a talk yesterday during the San Francisco Mini Medical School organized by California Pacific Medical Center/ Sutter Health, and making this distinction clear was in fact my main point.

The report provides great reading and several excellent recommendations for future research, including several areas we identified during the January SharpBrains Summit as areas where database-driven automated cognitive assessments are likely to add much value both to research and to clinical practice in years to come:

• “An objective and consensus-based definition of mild cognitive impairment needs to be developed, including identification of the cognitive areas of impairment, the recommended cognitive measures for assessment, and the degree of deviation from normal to meet diagnostic criteria. This consistency in definition and measurement is important to generate studies that can be pooled or compared to better assess risk factors and preventive strategies for cognitive decline and Alzheimer’s disease.”
• “A standardized, well-validated, and culturally sensitive battery of outcome measures needs to be developed and used across research studies to assess relevant domains of cognitive functioning in a manner that is appropriate for the functional level of the population sample being studied (e.g., cognitively normal, mild cognitive impairment); and age-gender specific norms need to be established for comparison and objective assessment of disease severity. We recommend a comprehensive approach to outcomes assessment that accounts for the impact of cognitive decline on other multiple domains of function and quality of life that may be affected by deficits in cognition (for example, emotional and physical functioning) of both the affected person and his or her primary caregiver.”
• “A simple, inexpensive, quantitative instrument to assess mild cognitive impairment, which can be administered in a repeated manner by trained (nonexpert) staff in both the primary care office and the research/specialty clinic, needs to be established. This instrument should be sensitive to changes over time across a wide range of cognitive abilities and social, cultural, and linguistic backgrounds. The development and widespread implementation of this instrument is essential to enable better research.”

To read report: click Here

You may already have read the hundreds of media articles today titled “brain training doesn’t work” and similar, based on the BBC “Brain Test Britain” experiment.

Once more, claims seem to go beyond the science backing them up … except that in this case it is the researchers, not the developers, who seem responsible.

Let’s recap what we learned today.

The Good Science

The study showed that putting together a variety of brain games in one website and asking people who happen to show up to play around for a grand total of 3-4 hours (10 minutes 3 times a week for 6 weeks) didn’t result in meaningful improvements in cognitive functioning. This is useful information for consumers to know, because in fact there are websites and companies making claims based on similar protocols. And this is precisely the reason SharpBrains exists, to help both consumers (through our book) and organizations (through our report) to make informed decisions. The paper only included people under 60, which is surprising, but, still, this is useful information to know.

A TIME article summarizes the lack of transfer well (we are going to refer to the Time article several times below, it was one of the best today):

“But the improvement had nothing to do with the interim brain-training, says study co-author Jessica Grahn of the Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit in Cambridge. Grahn says the results confirm what she and other neuroscientists have long suspected: people who practice a certain mental task — for instance, remembering a series of numbers in sequence, a popular brain-teaser used by many video games — improve dramatically on that task, but the improvement does not carry over to cognitive function in general.”

The Bad Science

The study, which was not a gold standard clinical trial, contained obvious flaws both in methodology and in interpretation, as some neuroscientists have started to point out. Back to the Time article:

“Klingberg (note: Torkel Klingberg is a cognitive neuroscientist who has published multiple scientific studies on the benefits of brain training, and founded a company on the basis of that published work)…criticizes the design of the study and points to two factors that may have skewed the results.

On average the study volunteers completed 24 training sessions, each about 10 minutes long — for a total of three hours spent on different tasks over six weeks. “The amount of training was low,” says Klingberg. “Ours and others’ research suggests that 8 to 12 hours of training on one specific test is needed to get a [general improvement in cognition].”

Second, he notes that the participants were asked to complete their training by logging onto the BBC Lab UK website from home. “There was no quality control. Asking subjects to sit at home and do tests online, perhaps with the TV on or other distractions around, is likely to result in bad quality of the training and unreliable outcome measures. Noisy data often gives negative findings,” Klingberg says.”

More remarkable, a critic of brain training programs had the following to say in this Nature article:

“I really worry about this study — I think it’s flawed,” says Peter Snyder, a neurologist who studies ageing at Brown University’s Alpert Medical School in Providence, Rhode Island.

…But he says that most commercial programs are aimed at adults well over 60 who fear that their memory and mental sharpness are slipping. “You have to compare apples to apples,” says Snyder. An older test group, he adds, would have a lower mean starting score and more variability in performance, leaving more room for training to cause meaningful improvement. “You may have more of an ability to see an effect if you’re not trying to create a supernormal effect in a healthy person,” he says.

Second, the “dosage” was small, Snyder said. The participants were asked to train for at least 10 minutes a day, three times a week for at least six weeks. That adds up to only four hours over the study period, which seemed modest to Snyder.

The Ugly Logic

Let’s think by analogy. Aren’t the BBC-sponsored researchers basing their very broad claims on this type of faulty logic?

1. We have decided to design and manufacture our first car ever
2. Oops, our car doesn’t work
3. Therefore, cars DON’T, CAN’T and WON’T work
4. Therefore, ALL car manufacturers are stealing your money.
5. Case closed, let’s all continue riding horses. Why change?

Klingberg points out this too, stressing to TIME that the study “draws a large conclusion from a single negative finding” and that it is “incorrect to generalize from one specific training study to cognitive training in general.”

Posit Science (SharpBrains materials have been critical of Posit Science’ claims in the past, but in this case I couldn’t agree more with what they are saying), tries to debunk the debunker:

“This is a surprising study methodology,” said Dr. Henry Mahncke, VP Research at Posit Science. “It would be like concluding that there are no compounds to fight bacteria because the compound you tested was sugar and not penicillin.”

We do need serious science and analysis on the value and limitations of scalable approaches to cognitive assessment, training and retraining. There are very promising published examples of methodologies that seem to work (which the BBC study not only ignored but directly contradicted), mixed with many claims not supported by evidence. What concerns me is that this study may not only manage to confuse the public even more, but to prevent much needed innovation to ensure we are better equipped over the next 5-10 years than we are today.

Resources:

• You can read the full paper Here (opens free 5-page PDF)
• TIME article: Here
• Nature article: Here
• My email to BBC six months ago: Here (we gave the BBC full access to the January SharpBrains Summit on Technology for Cognitive Health and Performance; they chose not to engage)
• Free online guide: Here
• Consumer book: Here
• Executive report: Here

Previous SharpBrains articles:

• Does Cognitive Training Work? For whom? for what?
• Are videogames good for you? It depends on who YOU are

Tomorrow we’ll probably witness a lot of media coverage about a experiment run by the BBC in the UK, to be published in Nature, on whether “brain training” works.

The paper is still embargoed, so we cannot comment on it, but what I can do is to share fragments of my email to a BBC reporter six months ago, discussing impressions on what they had announced as the ultimate test of whether “brain training” works.

Again, these were purely my impressions based on limited public information. Once we can comment on the published paper we’ll be able to provide a more informed perspective.

“Hello XYZ,

Here go some of my thoughts based on my external perception of your test:

• I agree with many of the premises for the test
• But “Does brain training really work” is a highly misleading frame: the obvious answer is, yes, it works as a category. If not, do you mean people can’t learn? meditate? go through cognitive therapy? cognitive retraining? increase working memory and other brain functions? All these are established beyond doubt through dozens of well-controlled studies where the intervention effect a) goes beyond placebo, and b) remains there once training is over. The 2009 report I sent you includes 10 Research Executive Briefs by leading scientists who reference published papers in high-quality journals. None evaluates Nintendo – but should they be ignored, as a group?
• Now, the key questions are, “what specific brain training are we talking about”, “work for what?” and “work for whom?”. That’s where we could help educate consumers separate hope from hype.
• …Right now you are inventing your own “brain game”, and the only thing you will test is whether that specific “brain game” you have develop “works” or not (not clear what outcome measures you have). I wouldn’t dare to manufacture my own car now from scratch and claim, based on the results, that “cars” work or don’t.
• I couldn’t agree more with “brain training that is good for one person might not be good for you”, since one of “brain training” properties (both strength and weakness) is its highly targeted nature. The implication? we need better assessments to pinpoint bottlenecks and direct appropriate intervention. consumers need better education and information to know what is a waste of time and money and what may be worthy. Yet, your test seems to fully ignore this, and test whether the same thing is good for everyone…you may be throwing out the baby with the water…”

Your thoughts?

(Will link to paper once published). Related articles:

• Does Cognitive Training Work? For whom? for what?
• Are videogames good for you? It depends on who YOU are

We have received 40 excellent entries to the inaugural Brain Fitness Innovation Awards describing pioneering initiatives to apply neuroplasticity-based findings and tools to a variety of purposes/ age groups through the lifespan: academic performance, sports performance, professional performance, healthy aging, clinical and mental health purposes. Most came from organizations based in North America, but we were glad to see also a good number coming from Europe and Asia Pacific.

More information here: Brain Fitness Innovation Awards.

Winners will be announced on May 24th at the State of Brain Fitness Innovation Webinar. Registration ($25) is open now, and participants with also be able to access the Executive Summary of our 2010 market report, and the LinkedIn private group SharpBrains Network for Brain Fitness Innovation.

Please remember we are accepting entries until end of this Thursday, April 15th. Winners will be announced on May 24th, 2010.

How to Apply: Organizations can use this Entry Form to submit entries (opens a Word document).

Description: the new annual Brain Fitness Innovation Awards, designed to foster innovation and best practice sharing by celebrating outstanding pioneers who apply neuroplasticity-based research and tools in the “real world”. The awards will recognize organizations that are devising and implementing results-oriented and scalable initiatives that demonstrate their commitment to the brain fitness of their clients, members, patients, students or employees, and showcase innovative uses of non-invasive tools to improve cognitive and emotional functions and real-world outcomes.

Prizes

• 1 Grand Prize Winner will receive: $2,500 check, plus other benefits.
• 2 Silver Prize Winners will each receive: $1,000 check, plus other benefits.
• 7 Finalists will each receive: $250 check, plus other benefits.

More information on Judges, process, and dates, here: 2010 Brain Fitness Innovation Awards.

Marian Diamond, UC-Berkeley: “People frequently do the same level of crossword puzzles to stimulate their brains year after year. They do not challenge their brains with more difficult levels of puzzles. In our research, we showed that if we challenged the rats to reach their food cups by having to climb over many obstructions, their brains increased more than those of rats who could walk unhindered to their food cups. Challenge increased brain size.”

Tom Warden, Allstate: “… we see the opportunity that cognitive training provides as just the next evolution of things that we can advocate and get behind that ultimately make for a better driving experience, a safer driving experience for people. Not only for our insureds, but to help the roads be safer for everyone…what we did is to attempt to replicate the results that were observed in the laboratory environment where older drivers who have completed a good amount of training, 10 hours or more of training, had shown that the risk of crash could be reduced by up to about 50%.”

David Whitehouse, OptumHealth Behavioral Solutions: “Managed care has not always been on the forefront of innovation and it has been, for us, a challenge and an excitement to think about how best to incorporate the latest findings in neuroscience. If I was to give you the major areas that we think are important, one is the importance of neuroscience capabilitties to improve triage, the second is the importance that this has on increasing access to much better functional assessments and its relationship to safety. The third is in the area of clinical decision support and the fourth is in brain health. First and foremost, why is it that in every other organ we have objective data of the organ itself doing its work under various loads to help us when we need to make decisions about its health and disease state and how best to support it and intervene.”

William Reichman, Baycrest: “…we must do for brain health in the 21st century what we largely accomplished in cardiovascular health in the past century…that includes an increased focus not only on tertiary prevention, but on primary and secondary prevention…approximately a year and a half ago the Ontario government made a decision to invest $10 million in Canada’s first centre for brain fitness to be housed at Baycrest at the Rotman Research Institute….Here in Canada I think that we’ve been able to make a compelling case maintaining good brain fitness needs to be a national priority for this country and we have been engaged in discussions with the government, both federally and provincially, that brain health programs really need to begin in childhood.”

P Murali Doraiswamy, Duke University: “… you don’t want to walk into a grocery store or into a gas station and see a brain game claiming that they’re a neuroplasticity brain game or a bottle of water that’s claiming it’s a cognitive reserve enhancer because then I think you’re going to destroy the whole field key…So I think it’s essential for academia, for industry, for think tanks, for even the federal government agencies such as perhaps England, US, Canada, to come together and form a set of guidelines that can really guide the proper development of a lot of these products and by products I’m talking about two types of products. One is cognitive screening instruments and the second is intervention products to either improve sort of normal functioning or to increase resilience to stress or three, to prevent disease.”

(answering to audience question, “when do you believe that cognitive screening may become a pretty routine part of standard medical care”) “I think it’s long overdue…the brain is the most important organ.”

—

In January of 2010 SharpBrains produced the inaugural virtual, global SharpBrains Summit on Technology for Cognitive Health and Performance (January 18-20th, 2010). The Summit featured a dream team of over 40 speakers who are leaders in industry and research to discuss emerging research, tools and best practices for cognitive health and performance, and gathered over 250 participants in 16 countries.

Are you interested in what over 40 leading scientists, clinicians, executives and technologists have to say about the latest Technology for Cognitive Health and Performance? Want to hear how they responded to more than 200 audience questions? You can Learn more Here (full transcripts are now available). SharpBrains readers can get a 15% discount using discount code: sharptech

Here you have the March edition of our monthly eNewsletter covering cognitive health and brain fitness topics. Please remember that you can subscribe to receive this free Brain Fitness eNewsletter by email, using the box in the right column.

Designed to foster innovation and best practice sharing by celebrating outstanding pioneers who apply neuroplasticity-based research and tools in the “real world”, the new Brain Fitness Innovation Awards are accepting entries until April 15th. You can submit an entry, and learn about the Judges, Prizes and Frequently Asked Questions, by clicking on 2010 Brain Fitness Innovation Awards. Winners will be announced on May 24th during the SharpBrains Summit on the State of The Brain Fitness Market.

The Big Picture

A Decade After the Decade of the Brain:  ”During the past two decades, neuroscientists have steadily built the case that the human brain, even when fully mature, is far more plastic—changing and malleable—than we originally thought. It turns out that the brain (at all ages) is highly responsive to environmental stimuli and that connections between neurons are dynamic and can rapidly change within minutes of stimulation”, says Dr. Nora Volkow,  Director of one of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), while discussing the medical and educational implications of neuroplasticity in this article prepared for Dana Foundation’s Cerebrum.

Improving Care through Policy, Standards, and Technology: Patrick Donohue, founder of the Sarah Jane Brain Project, granted SharpBrains an extended interview to discuss the PABI Plan in front of Congress, which may pass soon and help develop a model system for Pediatric Acquired Brain Injuries (PABI) which is the leading cause of death and disability for children and young adults from birth through 25 years of age in the United States. This plan has the potential to fundamentally transform brain care through the use of neuroinformatics and standarized systems of care. As Patrick points out, “technology is a very strong component to ensure scalability and foster innovation. Our expectation is that some genius student at MIT will find a way to analyze all the medical records, find patterns and predict potential solutions that can help specific patients.”

News

Cognitive therapy’s growing adoption in the UK: Since the UK’s National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) said that cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) should be the first-line treatment for mild to moderate depression –followed by drugs only if it proves unsuccessful– this type of mental training is gaining wider promotion by the National Health Service. We see US-based insurance companies taking good note.

Research Partnership on Cognitive Aging: The National Institute on Aging and McKnight Foundation partner to invest $28m in research given that “emerging evidence suggests that certain interventions — such as exercise, environmental enrichment, diet, social engagement, cognitive training and stress reduction — should be studied more intensively to determine if they might prevent or reduce declines in cognitive health”. We laud the initiative, and further ask: Why $28 million and not, say, $300m (one dollar per living American who tomorrow will be one day older than he or she is today)?, Why the emphasis on “prevent, reduce or reverse decline” and not on “develop, improve, maintain brain functionality for quality of life and productivity”?

Mind Stretching

10 Mitos sobre el Cerebro y el Entrenamiento Mental: By popular demand, we translated the article Debunking 10 Brain and Brain Fitness Myths to Spanish. Can you give it a try in Spanish first and see how it goes? If you are looking for added mental exercise and want to help us translate it to other languages, please let us know!

Brain Fitness Survey: please spare 5-10 minutes with us, answering a few stimulating questions such as “How important do you believe are the following brain functions to thrive personally and professionally in the XXI century”?

Finally, a quick note. I am going to travel extensively in Europe between June and November 2010. If you want to propose speaking or consulting engagements there, please Contact Us.

Have a stimulating Spring!

We are receiving  many good questions about the new Brain Fitness Innovation Awards; below you have a few Frequently Asked Questions. Please let us know if you have any more questions!

Is there a formal nomination process?
No. Any organization can submit an entry, and/ or encourage others to do so.

Can a vendor and a client organization submit a joint entry? if not, who submits the entry, and who wins the Award?
The Awards are designed to directly recognize Users, not Vendors. The primary organization to submit an entry and receive the Award is the one using latest tools and programs (technology-based on not) to take care of the brain fitness of their own clients/ patients/ employees. Now, the tools and programs used will be publicly recognized as part of Award Winner’s entry and case study.

Your evaluation criteria include “Value of Lessons Learned” (20%). What you mean by ‘lessons learned”?
Pioneers are willing to learn by doing and to share insights from their experience with other organizations which may be considering similar initiatives. For example, what were some difficulties in implementing and growing the program? what was end user response? how were results measured? what tool/s were selected and why?

Will the information contained in the submitted Entries be shared? They may be great case studies
Full 3 Winning Entries will be shared publicly, while full Finalist Entries will only be shared with Summit participants.

For more information, check out the Brain Fitness Innovation Awards page.

Excellent article in the UK’s newspaper The Independent on the growing adoption of cognitive-behavioural therapy (CBT) by the National Health Service (NHS). Very relevant to the US too, given that a growing number of insurers are offering computerized CBT. Quotes:

“Why are we asking this now?

There is growing frustration among GPs at the difficulty they face in providing psychological therapy for patients with mental problems including depression. A survey by the Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP) published at the weekend found almost two-thirds of respondents said they were “rarely” able to obtain treatment for patients within two months. Getting help for children who had suffered abuse or trauma was even more difficult. Professor Steve Field, the president of the RCGP, said: “People should have access to approved treatments, and this has to be a wake-up call.”

What does this mean for patients?

Whereas in the past, GPs might have prescribed Prozac or other antidepressants, cognitive-behavioural therapy (CBT) is now the treatment of first choice – where it is available – for the millions who turn up complaining they cannot cope. In 2007, the Government earmarked £173m to train 3,600 extra therapists by 2010.

So why the shortage of therapists?

The cash is no longer ring-fenced and has allegedly been siphoned away to pay for other projects. The RCGP and Mind, the mental-health charity, are campaigning for a commitment from all three main political parties to ring-fence cash for talking therapies. The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) says CBT should be the first-line treatment for mild to moderate depression, followed by drugs only if it proves unsuccessful.”

Keep reading  The Big Question: Does cognitive therapy work – and should the NHS provide more of it for depression? (The Independent)

Today, in honor of both Brain Awareness Week (March 15-21) and Brain Injury Awareness Month (March), it is my pleasure to interview Patrick Donohue, founder of the Sarah Jane Brain Project, a foundation launched in 2007 with the explicit aim to create a model system for children suffering from all Pediatric Acquired Brain Injuries, and an implicit potential, in my view, to fundamentally transform medical research through the use of neuroinformatics and standarized systems of care.

The Foundation: Story and Objectives

Alvaro Fernandez: Patrick, thank you very much for your time today. Can you please provide an overall perspective into what you are doing and why?

Patrick: Of course. The Sarah Jane Brain Project, named after my daughter Sarah Jane, started when she was shaken by her baby nurse when she was 5 days of age, which resulted in a severe brain injury. Through my continued efforts to help her, I couldn’t help but notice that the whole field of brain injury needs to make huge progress in a short time frame if it is to really help Sarah Jane – and thousands of children like her – with providing evidence-based, standardized systems of care. Probably 85% of patient needs are common, yet each case seems to require reinventing the wheel. Worse, little research has been done on children’s rehabilitation.

We probably know about 5% of what we will eventually know about the brain. The systems of research and care remind me of the computer science field in the 1950s: very promising, but fractured and inconsistent. In consulting with many experts on ways to accelerate progress, we realized we need to bring both significantly more resources and open source principles to the field of pediatric neurology. We launched the Sarah Jane Brain Project to transform the field to help Sarah Jane and thousands of kids like her.

Before you launched the Foundation, you worked as a lawyer and political consultant. How did that background help, or hinder, those very ambitious goals?

I believe my background was a great help, to bring an outside perspective to the problems that many scientists and doctors were already working on, and to know how to work with politicians and policy-makers to obtain needed attention and resources.

Pediatric Traumatic Brain Injury (PTBI) is the leading cause of death and disability for children and young adults from birth through 25 years of age in the United States, with more new cases in any given year than HIV/AIDS and Autism combined, yet it only receives a paultry portion of federal research money (we are talking a few million for brain injury vs, literally, billions toward other disease states that have less cases), and it was basically ignored during the ongoing health reform process.

Talking to dozens of experts, I met multiple networks and individuals in the TBI care community who had already identified the need to develop a solid pediatric model system, but needed support and resources. We brainstormed potential strategies, and came to see that we would need to cover all Acquired Brain Injury (including both traumatic and not traumatic causes), to increase learning, and to truly be, as I often say, “on the side of the angels” (I have witnessed before how movements fail when they start to become myopic and arbitrary). We also decided to cover birth to 25 years of age, given the slow maturation of the frontal lobes. We wanted to develop best plan possible, irrespective of status quo considerations. For example, we consciously decided not to tailor our plan to the idiosyncratic preferences of different funding sources, but to present the National PABI Plan, a large, and unsolicited, multi-department grant that crossed 7 departments.

Political ears respond to victims’ stories, and to budget-neutral plans. Our concurrent resolution of Congress (H.Con.Res.198) has over 100 co-sponsors in the U.S. House. This measure has the United States Congress endorsing this National PABI Plan as the plan to prevent, identify and treat all brain injuries from birth through 25 years of age while encouraging federal, state and local governments to begin implementing it. We expect it to pass very soon.

Policy Innovation at Federal and State Levels

Please explain the origins and core elements of the PABI Plan (opens 500+ PDF document)

Our National Advisory Board gathered in New York City for a three-day conference on January 8-10, 2009, to finish drafting the PABI Plan. On January 20, 2009, we sent the first letter to President Barack Obama at 12:01 p.m. introducing the PABI Plan to him.

At its core, the PABI plan wants to fund and implement a new model system, using open source informatics for the first time in medical history, to assist in the study and rehabilitation of children suffering from Pediatric Acquired Brain Injury (PABI). Families will be able to make available, on an anonymous basis, the complete medical and therapy records and information of children suffering from PABI to doctors, researchers, other parents and caregivers, therapists, students and the general public.

Our partners in this are 52 State Lead Centers that will focus on developing evidence-based standarized system of care across 7 categories of care. They will develop research plans, prioritizing key translational points, to help us accumulate the equivalent of 50 years of knowledge in just 5 years. That is our goal.

One important component of the plan was to ensure all this infrastructure became self-sustaining over time. Long term revenue streams will come from: a) a percentage of speed tickets will be devoted to research, and matched by private donors, b) our own Contract Research Organization, that will enable faster research given data available in the database, and c) legal advocacy efforts, that will redirect 25% of the referal fees to provide the resources necessary to subsidize these efforts for those families who need additional support.

Your Foundation and the ACSM announced a new initiative during the Super Bowl. What are the goals of the Zackery Lystedt Brain Project?

Zackery Lystedt sustained a serious brain injury in 2006 playing football, which inspired two years of hard work by his family and colleagues at Brain Injury Association of Washington to develop and pass the Zackery Lystedt Law in Washington State and prevent similar cases from happening. This was a brilliant law, the first concussion-specific laws covering all youth sports, and a budget-neutral one since it just requires additional info through existing mechanisms: 1) additional education for coaches to understand risks, 2) immediate removal from play of any athlete suspected of a concussion and 3) proper medical evaluation before a “back-to-play” decision.

Once we saw that law pass unanimously, the American College of Sports Medicine and the Sarah Jane Brain Foundation decided to partner to help other states to replicate that law. We may well get 24 states passing the laws or making serious headway this year.

The Roles of Technology and Philosophy

Technology seems an important enabler both of the PABI Plan -to store and mine the database, to develop and measure interventions- and the Zackery Lystedt Law -for example, more and more sports teams are using automated cognitive assessments to inform back-to-play decisions. What are your priorities now?

Indeed, technology is a very strong component in all this, to ensure scalability and foster innovation. Our expectation is that some genius student at MIT will find a way to analyze all the medical records, find patterns and predict potential solutions that can help specific patients. Perhaps then he or she will create a start-up, and help build a new eco-system around those new tools.

In terms of automated assessments, we try not to introduce too specific language in the legislation we advocate, to make sure each state retains flexibility. For example, New York State may go further than others in this area.

The PABI Plan includes a strong telehealth module, and a Virtual Center where families can aggregate and share personal health records. This Virtual Center will act as a large and open source Family Registry. Families will be able to opt-in, anonymously, and share a comprehensive set of data points. We plan to launch a Beta version this month, and the full version within a few months.

I would love to hear from anyone in your network with ideas in any of these areas.

We will publish this interview via our blog and upcoming annual report, so hopefully we can build bridges. This whole process to develop standardized systems of care, combining policy with database-driven innovation, could become a blueprint to accelerate progress in many other areas of brain health and performance

Those are your words, but I do believe so. For example, late last year I met a team of neurosurgeons at a Trauma Conference in Santa Barbara, and we discussed how to replicate what we are doing with adults over 25. We should be thinking about the brain through its whole lifetime, including for example Alzheimer’s Disease. We need to break the silos, to aggregate knowledge, to help advance our knowledge of the brain 50 years in 5 years.

My philosophy in all this is that “Things work out best for those who make the best out of the way things work out “. It is unfortunate that I got involved in this because of Sarah Jane’s problem, but I hope our best efforts will help her and many others like her.

Patrick, thank you very much for all your efforts to do so. Please do keep us updated, we want to share with our community when the Virtual Center/ Registry becomes available, and when PABI becomes law.

My pleasure. I will.

—

Links:

• Sarah Jane Brain Project
• PABI Plan
• First letter to President Barack Obama
• Zackery Lystedt Law
• Interview with Lee Woodruff on Bob Woodruff Foundation
• Head games and neuropsych assessments

If so, time to celebrate! Today starts 2010 Brain Awareness Week (opens website with calendar of activities and resources).

First of all, please take the time to say Hello to the new neurons that are being generated in your brain every single day. This morning you’ll have some “baby neurons” that weren’t there last night, thanks to lifelong neurogenesis. Then, consider, how will you put them to good use and help them thrive over time? To guide you here, Dr. Deb summarized the gist of 10 Habits of Highly Effective Brains:

1. Use it or lose it.
2. Take care of your nutrition.
3. Exercise your brain and your body. They nourish each other.
4. Practice positive thoughts until they become your default mindset.
5. Thrive on learning and mental challenges.
6. Aim high and keep learning.
7. Explore and travel.
8. Don’t Outsource Your Brain. Make your own decisions.
9. Develop and maintain stimulating friendships.
10. Laugh often.

Your brain will surely appreciate.

We are pleased to announce the new annual Brain Fitness Innovation Awards, designed to foster innovation and best practice sharing by celebrating outstanding pioneers who apply neuroplasticity-based research and tools in the “real world”. The awards will recognize organizations that are devising and implementing results-oriented and scalable initiatives that demonstrate their commitment to the brain fitness of their clients, members, patients, students or employees, and showcase innovative uses of non-invasive tools to improve cognitive and emotional functions and “real-world” outcomes.

Prizes

1 Grand Prize Winner will receive: $2,500 check, consulting session with SharpBrains staff, 2 tickets for each SharpBrains Summit in 2011; 10 signed copies of The SharpBrains Guide to Brain Fitness.

2 Silver Prize Winners will each receive: $1,000 check, consulting session with SharpBrains staff, 2 tickets for each SharpBrains Summit in 2011, 10 signed copies of The SharpBrains Guide to Brain Fitness.

7 Finalists will each receive: $250 check, 1 ticket for each SharpBrains Summit in 2011, 10 signed copies of The SharpBrains Guide to Brain Fitness.

How to Enter

Organizations can use this Entry Form to submit entries by end of Thursday, April 15th, 2010.

The 2010 Brain Fitness Innovation Awards will recognize unique initiatives that not only bring measurable benefits to end users but also are closely connected to furthering the objectives of the organization in which they operate, via (for example) increased customer/ patient satisfaction, employee engagement, branding benefits, professional development gains, and others. All eligible submissions will be evaluated based on the following criteria:

• 20%: Measurable Benefits for end users
• 20%: Measurable Benefits for organization
• 20%: Creativity and Innovation of approach
• 20%: Scalability of initiative
• 20%: Value of Lessons Learned

Process

March 10th: Awards announced
By April 15th: All entries collected
By April 30th: SharpBrains staff selects 10 finalists
By May 15th: judges score finalists and select 1 Grand Prize Winner and 2 Silver Prize Winners
May 24th: Winners will be announced on Monday, May 24th, at the SharpBrains Summit – The State of the Brain Fitness Market

Confirmed Judges

• Alvaro Fernandez, Co-Founder of SharpBrains
• Baba Shiv, Professor at Stanford Business School
• Bill Tucker, Managing Director at Education Sector
• Brian Murphy, President of De Anza College
• Charles Jennings, Director of the McGovern Institute Neurotechnology Program, MIT
• Chuck House, Executive Director of Stanford Media X
• Colin Milner, CEO of the International Council on Active Aging
• Elizabeth Edgerly, National Spokesperson for Alzheimer’s Association “Maintain Your Brain”
• Gloria Cavanaugh, Former President of the American Society on Aging
• Kenneth Kosik, Co-Director of UC-Santa Barbara Neuroscience Research Institute
• Margaret Morris, Senior Researcher at Intel’s Digital Health Group
• Nigel Smith, AARP Strategy and Planning Director
• P Murali Doraiswamy, Head of Biological Psychiatry at Duke University
• Rod Falcon, Director of Health Horizons Program at the Institute For The Future
• Stephen Macknik, Lab Director at Barrow Neurological Institute
• Susan Hoffman, Director of OLLI @ Berkeley

May 24th Summit

2010 Brain Fitness Innovation Award Winners will be announced during the SharpBrains Virtual Summit on the State of the Brain Fitness Market, to be held on Monday, May 24th, 2010, from 8am to 4pm US Pacific Time. Registered attendees will receive an electronic copy of SharpBrains’ annual report The State of the Brain Fitness Software Market 2010, the most comprehensive report on the category, to be released and discussed during the Summit.

Summit Agenda

8am. Bird’s-Eye View: Top Events, Indicators, Trends

8.30am. Market Survey on Beliefs, Attitudes, Purchase Habits
9am. Competitive Landscape: Leading Assessments and Training Tools
9.30am. State-of-the-Art Research and Development
10am. Watercooler Chat

10.30am. Consumer Data and Trends
11am. Healthcare, Insurance, Senior Living Data and Trends
11.30am. Lunch Break

12.30pm. K12 Data and Trends
1pm. Military, Corporate, Sports Data and Trends
1.30pm. Future Directions – Projections, Themes and Risks
2pm. Watercooler Chat

2.30pm. 2010 Brain Fitness Innovation Awards
3.30-4pm. Watercooler Chat and Wrap-Up

Past Summit attendees/annual report buyers include:  AARP, Aberdare Ventures, Abington Memorial Hospital, Agility Group, Alegent Health, Applied Cognitive Engineering, Aspyr Media, Baycrest, BCM Technologies, Belmont Village, Binnacle Capital, BKIN Technologies, Bon Secours New York Health System, Brain Resource, Brookdale Senior Living, Campbell Soup Company, Care One, Choratech, Clinton Global Initiative, Club One, CNS Vital Signs, Cogmed, Cognitive Media, CogState, CORE Health, Credit Suisse, Dakim, Easter Seals, EDGE Innovation Network, Ericsson, Ernst & Young, FDA, First Currency R &D, FitBrains, Fonterra, HappyNeuron, Institute for Behavioral Health Informatics, Intel Corporation, International Masters Publishers, Inverness Medical Innovations, Johnson & Johnson, Johnson & Johnson Development Corporation, Kaiser Permanente, LEAF, LearningRx, Lumos Labs, Medisolve, Merit Entertainment, NeuroCare Network, Mindware Lab, Neuroimage, NovaVision, One Laptop Per Child, Ontario Long Term Care Association, OptumHealth Behavioral Solutions, Oregon Health & Science University, Osher Lifelong Learning Institutes, Osmium Partners, Pfizer, Piedmont Gardens, Posit Science, Proactive Aging, Procter & Gamble, Scientific Learning, Sovereign Health, Sun Microsystems, Sunrise Senior Living, Sutter Health, The Wellness Alliance, Unilever, USAA, US Army Research Lab, Technology Partners, vibrantBrains, Visiting Angels, Westminster Communities.

You can Learn More about Innovation Awards and May 24th Summit Here.

via Press release:

The Research Partnership in Cognitive Aging, a public-private effort to promote the study of brain function with age, will award up to $28 million over five years to 17 research grants to examine the neural and behavioral profiles of healthy cognitive aging and explore interventions that may prevent, reduce or reverse cognitive decline in older people.

The partnership, led by the National Institute on Aging (NIA), part of the National Institutes of Health, and the McKnight Brain Research Foundation (MBRF), is seeking ways to maintain cognitive health — the ability to think, learn and remember — into old age.

Hodes pointed out that emerging evidence suggests that certain interventions — such as exercise, environmental enrichment, diet, social engagement, cognitive training and stress reduction — should be studied more intensively to determine if they might prevent or reduce declines in cognitive health.

All the studies are fascinating, and a few of them may have significant impact in the near-term given market trends:

• Ellen F. Binder, M.D., and Mark A. McDaniel, Ph.D., Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis: Combining Exercise and Cognitive Training to Improve Everyday Function. A pilot trial in 90 older adults will evaluate whether cognition improves when aerobic exercise is combined with cognitive enrichment provided by a specific research-based video game. The randomized trial is aimed at finding an intervention to improve day-to-day cognitive function.
• Mark D’Esposito, M.D., University of California, Berkeley: A Brain-Based Approach to Enhancing Executive Control Functions in Healthy Aging
• Patricia A. Boyle, Ph.D., Rush University Medical Center, Chicago: Characterizing the Behavior Profile of Healthy Cognitive Aging
• Randy L. Buckner, Ph.D., Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston: Neural Processes Underlying Cognitive Aging
• Joe Z. Tsien, Ph.D., Medical College of Georgia, Augusta: Hippocampal Network Profiles of Memory Aging.
• Yaakov Stern, Ph.D., Columbia University, New York: Combined Exercise and Cognitive Training Intervention in Normal Aging

For more information

• Press release: Here
• Website: Research Partnership in Cognitive Aging

My two cents:

• Why $28 million and not, say, $300m (one dollar per living American who tomorrow will be one day older than he or she is today)?
• Why the main emphasis on “prevent, reduce or reverse decline” and not on “develop, build, maintain functionality”?

(Editor’s Note: by popular demand, following goes the Spanish translation of an excerpt from The SharpBrains Guide to Brain Fitness, available in English by clicking on Debunking 10 Brain and Brain Fitness Myths)

10 MITOS SOBRE EL CEREBRO Y EL ENTRENAMIENTO MENTAL: VERDADERO O FALSO?

Extraído del libro electrónico “La guía de SharpBrains para un cerebro en forma” (The SharpBrains Guide to Brain Fitness). Con permiso de sus autores Alvaro Fernández y Dr.Elkhonon Goldberg.

Mito 1. Mis genes determinan el destino de mi cerebro

Realidad. La neuroplasticidad hace que nuestro estilo de vida, acciones y experiencias tengan un rol importante en la evolución física de nuestro cerebro a lo largo de toda la vida, especialmente dado el incremento de la esperanza de vida.

Mito 2. El envejecimiento acarrea automáticamente el declive cognitivo

Realidad. No hay nada inherentemente fijado sobre la trayectoria precisa de cómo nuestros cerebros evolucionarán con la edad

Mito 3. La medicación es la principal esperanza para la mejoría cognitiva

Realidad. Las intervenciones no invasivas pueden tener efectos comparables y más duraderos, libres de efectos secundarios

Mito 4. Pronto tendremos una “píldora mágica” o solución general para resolver los desafíos cognitivos

Realidad. La investigacion cientifica existente recomienda un enfoque multifacético, centrado en nutrición, regulacion emocional y ejercitación tanto física como mental.

Mito 5. Hay un solo “lo” en “úselo o piérdalo”

Realidad. El cerebro está compuesto de múltiples estructuras y funciones especializadas.Nuestra calidad de vida y productividad dependen de una multiplicidad de funciones, no de una sola

Mito 6. Todas las actividades o ejercicios mentales son iguales

Realidad. Diferentes actividades activan diferentes partes del cerebro, con lo cual es importante mantener un regimen de ejercicios variados y enfocados para asi estimular un amplio rango de funciones cognitivas

Mito 7. Hay una sola manera de entrenar el cerebro

Realidad. Las funciones cognitivas pueden impactarse de diversas maneras: a través de meditación, terapia cognitiva, biofeedback, y entrenamiento cognitivo

Mito 8. Todos tenemos algo llamado “edad cerebral”

Realidad. La “edad cerebral” es una ficción. No hay 2 personas con el mismo cerebro o manifestación de funciones cerebrales a una msma edad

Mito 9. Esa supuesta “edad cerebral” puede reducirse en 10, 20, o 30 años

Realidad. El entrenamiento cerebral puede mejorar determinadas funciones cognitivas, pero con las investigaciones disponibles actualmente no se puede decir que se puede reducir la “edad cerebral” en un cierto número de años.

Mito 10. Todos los cerebros humanos necesitan el mismo entrenamiento

Realidad. Al igual que con la gimnasia física los usuarios deben preguntarse: “Qué funciones necesito mejorar?” “En qué tiempo?”, “Cuál es mi presupuesto?”

Here you have the February edition of our monthlyeNewsletter covering cognitive health and brain fitness topics. Please remember that you can subscribe to receive this Newsletter by email, using the box in the right column.

The recent SharpBrains Summit witnessed the convergence of Benjamin Franklin’s words (”Man is a Tool-Making Animal”)  with neuroscientist Santiago Ramon y Cajal’s  (”Every man can, if he so desires, become the sculptor of his own brain.”) The neuroplasticity revolution that may well transform education, training, healthcare, aging, is under way.

New Tools

Will the Apple iPad Be Good for your Brain: Prof. Luc Beaudoin lays out key criteria to assess Apple iPad’s potential value for our cognitive fitness, and judges the iPad against a comprehensive checklist.  His verdict? Thumbs-up.

Is Working Memory a better predictor of academic success than IQ?: Dr. Tracy Alloway summarizes  a recent landmark study, published in the Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, which  tracked children over a six-year period. Key finding: Working memory can be a more powerful predictor of academic success than IQ scores.

Old Tools

Building Fit Minds Under Stress: According to Science Daily’s take on a just published study, “a high-stress U.S. military group preparing for deployment to Iraq has demonstrated a positive link between mindfulness training, or MT, and improvements in mood and working memory”.

The Evolution of Empathy: Empathy is not a uniquely human trait, explains primatologist Frans de Waal in this Greater Good Magazine article. Apes and other animals feel it as well, suggesting that empathy is truly an essential part of who we are.

Reflections

Reflections on Creativity – Interview with Daniel Tammet:  Scott Barry Kaufman recently interviewed Daniel Tammet, known for vividly describing autistic savantism from the inside. Their in-depth conversation made Scott reflect that “Daniel Tammet’s feeling of a great loneliness and isolation growing up spoke to me, for sure. But I’m sure it also spoke to a great many people reading the interview.”

Summit Reactions

The SharpBrains Summit took place January 18-20th, helping engage over 250 participants in 15 countries. Here are a couple of reactions from participants:

5 Key Reflections on “Neurocentric Health”: Institute For The Future researcher Jake Dunagan summarizes his main take-aways, including this overall assessment – “Although the conference was virtual, aside from the rigors of travel and a basket of bagels on the hallway table, my level of intellectual stimulation (and fatigue) mirrored most of my face-to-face conference experiences. It was a technical success and the content was first-rate.” (Thanks, Jake!)

The Future of Cognitive Enhancement: Neuroethics researcher Peter Reiner ponders,  “Will brain fitness software dominate the world of cognitive enhancement?”.  His take: “Prior to this conference I was quite skeptical, but the overall impression that I was left with was that brain fitness software may turn out to have some distinct advantages over pharmacological approaches.” Read his article to discover why.

Community

Network for Brain Fitness Innovation (private LinkedIn group):  Members are engaging in many good discussions, including most surprising things learned during the SharpBrains Summit, how to deal with conflicts of interest in industry and academia, resources and conferences relevant to education and children, and ways to elicit a wider interest in brain health.

Looking for Speakers: We are always looking for best practices and research-based innovation. If you are interested in speaking at future SharpBrains events (including Games for Health brain tracks), please Contact Us and tell us about 1) your innovation or research, 2) its measured and/ or potential impact, 3) recent coverage in general, trade, or scientific media, 4) the typical audience you talk to, and a couple of descriptions of recent talks, 5) what you propose talking about.

Offer

Brain Fitness Information Package for Libraries:  libraries of all kinds can now  order a copy of our main report, The State of the Brain Fitness Software Market 2009, at 50% off price.  Using discount code sharplibrary leaves this premium report at $645 (offer valid until March 31st, 2010). Offer is  valid for individuals and organizations who commit to donating their copy to a library, in good shape, after consulting it.

Finally, a reminder that Brain Awareness Week (March 15-21, 2010) is approaching soon!

Very interesting and relevant recent study on the impact of mindfulness meditation (noticed thanks to heads up by SharpBrains reader John):

Building Fit Minds Under Stress (Science Daily)

• “high-stress U.S. military group preparing for deployment to Iraq has demonstrated a positive link between mindfulness training, or MT, and improvements in mood and working memory”
• The study also suggests that sufficient mindfulness training (MT) practice may protect against functional impairments associated with high-stress challenges that require a tremendous amount of cognitive control, self-awareness, situational awareness and emotional regulation

Please note that this wasn’t a properly randomized study, so in fact much/ most of the effect may be due to the placebo effect, but still the findings seem to be consistent with a growing body of evidence on the brain-based effects of structured mental training in the form of meditation (usually mindfulness meditation).

Full study Here (opens PDF).

Related articles:

• Meditation on the Brain – a Conversation with Andrew Newberg: “What is happening is that specific practices that have traditionally been associated with religious and spiritual contexts may also be very useful from a mainstream, secular, health point of view, beyond those contexts.”
• Mindful Kids, Peaceful Schools: With eyes closed and deep breaths, students are learning a new method to reduce anxiety, conflict, and attention disorders. But don’t call it meditation.
• Mindfulness Meditation for Adults & Teens with Attention Deficits: David Rabiner comments on a recent published study, saying that “although this is clearly a preliminary study, the results are both interesting and encouraging”