On October 18, 2010 ABC-Good Morning America –presented a study led by the First Lady of California Maria Shriver in association with the Alzeihmer society titled “A woman’s Nation takes on Alzheimer.” It focused on how to care ,reasearch and look for a cure for this disease. Part of its emphasis was a look into how alzheimer affects those who take care of the patients. This got me wondering on how technology can ease the 24/7 caregiving for alzeihemer’s patients. Person taking care of people with Alzheimer's disease require access to high quality medical, personal, practical and financial information.
Recent developments in information technology could offer assistance to AD patients in ways that could supplement the loss of biological function with mechanical functions. In the series there was this teenage girl, whose father has the illness, and the only way she could get her dad’s “mind back” is by singing a specific song. Sometimes she had to sing it several times for her father to just recognize who she was or to just say “I Love you”. This got me thinking how, using informatics tools, such a song could be recorded in her voice and replayed several times a day to assist the patient with some form of cognition. A computer could also be used to keep records of the family members to help them remind the patient about their past. A computer small enough to fit into someone's eyeglasses, coupled with voice and image recognition technology, could provide AD patients with the kinds of information they need to continue to function. This, along with drugs could slow the process and potentially provide a treatment that could restore a quality of life to the patient in a way that is currently unavailable.
Information technology could be used to help the caregivers with the responsibilities of monitoring the AD patients as well as informing the caregivers about AD and answering their questions. A tele-health system could be used to assist the healthcare provider with monitoring the patients in their home setting. On the other hand it can engage the patients in many different activities to reduce the caregivers stress.
Scientist Hans Moravec has suggested that someday, entire human brains and the consciousnesses they hold will be able to be downloaded into a computer. This would avoid the problem of neuronal deterioration, and provide for the time and opportunity to conduct research that would provide information that would allow AD to be livable and/or curable illness.
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