SBIR-STTR Award

The overall objective of this project is to develop an automatic adaptive testing system that rapidly identifies specific cognitive deficits to aid in medical and operational decision making. This system will greatly increase the usability of test systems developed under Army sponsorship during the last 20 years, resulting in a product with broad application in both military and civilian environments. Existing computerized neuropsychological testing systems will be evaluated for their ability to detect changes in attention, perception, memory, and psychomotor skills and abilities. A number of tests will be selected to serve as a cognitive survey test battery, which will be the first step in the triage process. To home in on problematic areas detected in the cognitive survey a logic tree for reconfiguring the test battery on the fly will be developed. This process will employ demographically-stratified normative values for key variables on the survey portion of the test to select appropriate tests and test parameters for subsequent testing

The overall objective of this project is to develop an automatic adaptive testing system that rapidly identifies specific cognitive deficits to aid in medical and operational decision making. The Phase I effort produced a prototype adaptive triage system. ANAMts, designed to automatically focus testing on specific cognitive domains. ANAMts consists of a 4-level adaptive cognitive testing system and logic tree based on ANAM test modules. ANAMts uses demographically-stratified normative values for key variables to select the appropriate path through the system, customizing the sequence of tests to which each participant is exposed, resulting in a concise clinical report. Phase II will implement ANAMts on both desktop and handheld computers, verify system performance in normal volunteers, and conduct a validation and specificity test in patients with mild head trauma.

Keywords:
Triage, Diagnosis, Anam, Ares, Cognitive Assessment, Fitness For Duty, Neuropsychology, Computerized