bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
82 Development of a Hybrid Teleneuropsychology Clinic within a VA Medical Center: A Qualitative Evaluation of Patient and Clinician Expectations and Experiences.
Authors: Rodriguez Dayana , Moore Ian , Haj-Hassan Shereen 
Published: December 2023

Objective:Gaining access to specialty care services, including neuropsychology, can be challenging, especially for older adults and individuals who live in rural areas. In addition to these barriers, the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic further disrupted patient access to essential healthcare services. Telehealth, which underwent rapid expansion in response to service disruptions due to COVID-19, offers opportunities to prevent or reduce disruptions in patient care, including neuropsychological assessment. Here we describe the development and implementation of a teleneuropsychology (telenp) clinic within a major VA medical center and discuss salient clinical observations and patient feedback gathered during telenp evaluations.Participants and Methods:A hybrid telenp clinic was developed at the Tennessee Valley VA Healthcare system to serve patients referred for neuropsychological evaluations whose access to services was impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. Patients presented to the VA and were connected to neuropsychology providers seated in separate rooms of the hospital through synchronous video. Test batteries were created to closely approximate in-person evaluations while allowing for minor procedural modifications so tests could be administered virtually. All tests were administered by on-site trained staff. After the evaluation, anecdotal information about patient experiences and satisfaction and salient clinical observations were gathered to elucidate potential benefits and shortcomings of hybrid telenp model.Results:65 telenp neuropsychological evaluations were conducted between December 2020 and April 2021. Overall, patients consistently and strikingly reported a high degree of openness and acceptance towards telenp services, even despite initial technological apprehension. Importantly, patients ubiquitously reported believed they were able to adequately engage in telenp assessments, and no perceptible barriers were identified. Clinically, examiners consistently expressed surprise at the relative ease with which the evaluations could be adapted to a telenp program. Additionally, clinicians generally felt confident in the validity of the results and that the data gathered were sufficient to answer the referral question and make salient treatment recommendations and referrals. Importantly, there were some notable limitations to telenp assessment and not all patients were testable via telehealth.Conclusions:Qualitatively, hybrid telenp evaluations are feasible and acceptable, and appear to be a valid alternative to face to face neuropsychological assessments. Future research should focus on establishing the reliability and validity of telenp testing compared to face-to-face testing, collective quantitative data regarding patient and clinician experiences of telenp and identify methods for implementing telenp in clinics in rural catchment areas to increase access to neuropsychological services.
85 Smartwatch reminders support prospective memory in Korsakoff’s syndrome
Authors: Oudman Erik , Lloyd Beth , Smits Sterre , Altgassen Mareike , Postma Albert 
Published: December 2023

Objective:Korsakoff’s syndrome (KS) is a neuropsychiatric disorder, caused by malnutrition. Central to KS are severe amnesia and executive dysfunctions. KS patients often fail to remember future intentions (prospective memory),and rely heavily on external support by caregivers. Recently, specialized smartwatches have been developed to support prospective memory verbally and by displaying pictures of future events. We investigated the benefit of a smartwatch and smartphone compared to no aid in supporting time accuracy and the ability to carry out future intentions in one case study. In three subsequent case studies, we investigated the possible benefits of a smartwatch aid for prospective memory (PM) compared to verbal in-person reminders.Participants and Methods:In the first case study, one high-functioning KS patient with a WAIS IQ of 127 points, performed a total of 36 novel prospective memory tasks in three conditions (smartwatch, smartphone and no-aid).In the second case series, three KS patients with average IQ performed 30 everyday PM tasks in two conditions (smartwatch, in-person).Two dependent variables were indexed in both studies: PM time accuracy (in minutes), this was calculated as minutes difference from the assigned time, and precision of the PM task (correct or incorrect).Results:In the first study, time accuracy was improved with a smartwatch compared to a smartphone and no-aid condition. Furthermore, the smartwatch and smartphone conditions were more effective than no aid in assisting memory for task content. In the second study, both the smartwatch and in-person instructions were equally effective in supporting prospective memory tasks.Conclusions:Since prospective memory is compromised in KS, patients require assistance throughout the day in performing everyday and non-everyday tasks. The results of our case studies suggest that a smartwatch that gives specific verbal and visual reminders can be particularly helpful in supporting prospective memory for KS patients. Giving in-person instructions was equally effective as the use of this smartwatch, highlighting the possibility to support KS patients with less intensive everyday coaching. Together, these results are promising in applying smartwatches clinically to support prospective memory.
Plenary D: (Birch Memorial Lecture) Networking towards a Global Neuropsychology: An Invitation to Action
Authors: Koltai Deborah 
Published: December 2023

Abstract & Learning Objectives:This lecture will review the progress that we have made in becoming a global field of clinical practice and research and the challenges that await us to consider ourselves a field with worldwide reach and utility. We will inventory the spread of neuropsychology over the last decades, and highlight geographical areas where we are most under-represented. The challenges of supporting the training and subsequent work of neuropsychologists in developing countries will be discussed, as well as the complexity of instrumentation validation and normative standard development in settings with substantial linguistic and ethnic diversity. Importantly, we will explore avenues that each participant can consider leaning into to participate effectively in the development of a global neuropsychology.Upon conclusion of this course, learners will be able to:
1.Describe what we know of neuropsychology clinical practice, research, and teaching in Africa.2.Assess the challenges of developing neuropsychology as a field that are unique to Africa.3.Identify multiple ways that they can support the global development of neuropsychology, crossing topics that include cultural humility, instrument development and validation, shared resources, and mentoring.
3 The Effect of Face and Body Expressions on the Process of Learning and Memory of Images Among Healthy Participants and Individuals with Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI): Examination Using Eye Movements
Authors: Lugasi Natalie , Sacher Yaron , Vakil Eli 
Published: December 2023

Objective:Context-Dependent Effect (CDE) is a process by which restoring the original learning context enhances recall ability of the material being studied. One type of context is body expressions. Memory is one of the most common areas affected by Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI). However, although the performance of people with TBI is lower than that of healthy people in most memory-related parameters, both groups show evidence for CDE. We examined the CDE via behavioral and eye movement measures.Participants and Methods:Twenty-four healthy individuals and 27 patients with moderate-tosevere TBI participated in a memory task. Participants were exposed to pictures of people with neutral facial expression and neutral body expression and were asked to remember them for a subsequent memory test. In the testing session, they were asked to determine whether or not the person presented to them had appeared before, under two conditions: (1) where the context remains constant (facial expression and body expression remained neutral- the Repeat condition) (2) where the context changes (facial expression remained neutral and the body changed to angry or happy expression - the Re-pair condition).Results:While memory of the individuals with TBI was poorer than that of the control group, both groups exhibited CDE, as this effect was stronger in the Repeat condition compared to the Re-pair angry condition. We found that participants spent most of their time looking at the head. In addition, in both groups, we found a CDE and a group effect with regard to the difference in Dwell Time, so DT toward faces in the Repeat condition was higher than toward faces in the Re-pair condition. Also, DT toward correctly recognized people was higher among the control group than the TBI group. This effect appeared in the study and test phases.Conclusions:This study supports previous research showing evidence for CDE using body expression in the TBI group, like the control group, and extends our comprehension of the relationship between eye movements, memory, and context of facial and body expression.
Plenary E: Learning from patients: people who have changed my way of thinking
Authors: Wilson Barbara 
Published: December 2023

Abstract & Learning Objectives:This presentation discusses six patients with different problems, referred for rehabilitation, who challenged my views on how to apply neuropsychological principles to their treatment. We begin with Derek, who had sustained a traumatic brain injury from a gunshot wound. I was asked to reduce his weight, but he could not read or write because of the brain injury so I had to find another way to achieve the weight loss. This made me realize that neuropsychologists have to "think on their feet" and be flexible. The second patient is Kate, who developed brain stem encephalitis. Expected to die, and unable to speak, she convinced me that, however severe the injury, we should not give up and recovery can continue for many years. Kate, managed to speak intelligibly fourteen years after her illness! The next patient, Claire, a school nurse, had herpes simplex encephalitis which left her with prosopagnosia and extreme anxiety. Her story made me realize the personal consequences of prosopagnosia that is typically overlooked by most neuropsychologists. The fourth patient, Gary, was attacked by a gang while saving his father. He remained in a state of unconsciousness for 19 months and, thus, had a very poor prognosis. Nevertheless, he defied the predictions of all medical staff, woke up and did very well. The penultimate patient is Natasha, who, as far as we know is the only person in the world to have two syndromes, "Sheehans Syndrome" which is very rare in developed countries and "Sickle cell disease" which is not rare. As a result of the Sheehan's she developed Balint's Syndrome. Her case made me learn about Sheehan's Syndrome and accept that Natasha's main goal in life, was not what I expected it to be. The final patient is Paul, an opera singer, who was diagnosed with" Locked-in Syndrome" following a brain stem stroke. Not only was he a good communicator once a good system was found, but he felt he had a good quality of life by" living within his head". Although many of us feel that to be fully conscious but totally dependent on others, is a very cruel situation to be in, Paul did not feel this. All these patients taught me a great deal and I thank them for this.Upon conclusion of this course, learners will be able to:
1.Describe the main purposes of neuropsychological rehabilitation2.Discuss about six patients who challenged typical concepts about neuropsychological rehabilitation3.Gain some knowledge about Sheehan's syndrome4.Explain the three components of Balint's syndrome5.Summarize the difference between Locked-in syndrome and the minimally conscious state6.Recognize some of the anatomy associated with these syndromes
1 Adaptation of the Addenbrooke’s Cognitive Examination III for the Bengali speaking population in India: A systematic approach to reducing cultural and linguistic bias
Authors: Dutt Aparna , Nandi Ranita , Sulakshana Rao P. , Bhargava Pallavi , Goplakrishnan Subha , Bose Arpita , Ghosh Amitabha , Evans Jonathan J 
Published: December 2023

Objective:A systematic approach is vital for adapting neuropsychological tests developed and validated in western monocultural, educated and English-speaking populations. However, rigorous and uniform methods are often not implemented during adaptation of neuropsychological tests and cognitive screening tools across different languages and cultures. This has serious clinical implications. Our group has adapted the Addenbrooke’s Cognitive Examination (ACE) III for the Bengali speaking population in India. We have taken a 'culture-specific’ approach to adaptation and illustrate this by describing the process of adapting the ACE III naming sub-test, with a focus on the process of selecting culturally appropriate and psychometrically reliable itemsParticipants and Methods:Two studies were conducted in seven phases for adapting the ACE III naming test. Twenty-three items from the naming test in the English and the different Indian ACE-R versions were administered to healthy Bengali speaking literate adults to determine image agreement, naming and familiarity of the items. Eleven items were identified as outliers. We then included 16 culturally appropriate items that were semantically similar to the items in the selected ACE-R versions of which 3 were identified as outliers. The final corpus consisting of 24 items was administered to 30 patients with mild cognitive Impairment, Alzheimer’s disease and vascular dementia, and 60 healthy controls matched for age and education to determine which items in the corpus best discriminated patients and the controls, and to examine their difficulty levels.Results:The ACE III Bengali naming test with an internal consistency of .76 included 12 psychometrically reliable, culturally relevant high naming-high familiarity and high naming-low familiarity living and non-living items. Item difficulty ranged from .47 to .88 and had discrimination indices >.44.Conclusions:A key question for test development/adaptation is whether to aim for culture-broad or culture-specific tests. Either way, a systematic approach to test adaption will increase the likelihood that a test is appropriate for the linguistic/cultural context in which it is intended to be used. Adaptation of neuropsychological tests based on a familiarity driven approach helps to reduce cultural bias at the content level. This coupled with appropriate item selection statistics helps to improve the validity of the adapted tests and ensure cross-cultural comparability of test scores both across and within nations.
18 Improving Job Interview Skills in Autistic Youth Using a Combined Intervention Approach Inspired by Positive Psychology
Authors: Genova Helen M , Haas Mikayla , Elsayed Heba , Dacanay Michael , Hendrix Lauren , DeLuca John 
Published: December 2023

Objective:Nearly 85% of adults on the autism spectrum are unemployed, although nearly 70% of those who are unemployed express a desire and willingness to work. The job interview has been identified as a significant obstacle to obtaining employment by young adults on the spectrum. A growing field of research has been focused on evaluating innovative training tools to improve interview skills. Our previous work shows that a virtual reality job interview training (VR-JIT) tool improves certain job interview skills (such as sounding professional, establishing rapport), but does not improve the ability to speak about personal strengths and abilities. The current study combined VR-JIT with a new training tool: Kessler Foundation Strength Identification and Expression (KF-STRIDE), an intervention grounded in principles of positive psychology. KF-STRIDE targets identification of personal character strengths and expressing those strengths to employers in a socially appropriate way.Participants and Methods:The current study evaluated data from 20 autistic youth, randomized to an experimental group (n=10) and a services-as-usual (SAU) control group (n=10). Those in the experimental group participated in a 12 session intervention (9 sessions using VR-JIT and 3 sessions in KF-STRIDE). Each session was roughly one hour. Job interview performance was assessed by video-recorded mock job interviews rated by blinded assessors pre- and post- the intervention. Paired samples t-tests were conducted to examine differences in job interview skills from baseline to follow up in both groups.Results:The intervention group showed a significant improvement from baseline to follow-up in job interview skills in general (p = .004), and specifically sharing strengths about themselves to a future employer (p = .004). No significant differences were seen from baseline to follow-up in the SAU group. Conclusions: Individuals on the autism spectrum are significantly underemployed, which negatively impacts one’s ability to lead an independent life. Two innovative tools: VR-JIT and KF-STRIDE successfully improved job interview skills, including the ability to identify and express personal strengths. These findings indicate that these combined tools may help to improve employment skills for individuals on the autism spectrum.
Symposium 11: Military TBI: Neural and Clinical Correlates of Cognitive Function
Authors: Hungerford Lars 
Published: December 2023

Summary Abstract:This symposium will highlight recent advances in understanding, assessment, and treatment of the effect traumatic brain injury has on cognitive functioning in military Service Members and Veterans. Since 2000, U.S. Service Members have sustained over 450,000 brain injuries, the majority of which are mild. Although TBI mechanisms and characteristics among Service Members can differ from civilians in significant ways, research being conducted at Department of Defense and Veterans Affairs sites to address this problem can also yield benefits to civilians with TBI. Four presentations will focus on various aspects of TBI evaluation and treatment based on findings from their own research. Dr. Mark Ettenhofer will present findings relating to promising new eye tracking measures and their relationship to standardized cognitive test results among Service Members with mild traumatic brain injury. Next, Dr. Victoria Merritt will examine the role of symptom attribution on treatment-seeking Veterans with a remote history of traumatic brain injury. In particular, Dr. Merritt will be examining both self-reported symptoms as well as performance on objective neurocognitive tests. Dr. Jason Bailie will describe an ongoing study comparing a novel approach to cognitive rehabilitation, Strategic Memory Advanced Reasoning Training (SMART), to traditional cognitive rehabilitation interventions in Active Duty Service Members. The results of this study have significant implications for treatment of all individuals with chronic symptoms following mTBI, regardless of military status. Finally, Dr. Jared Rowland will present findings on the influence of mild traumatic brain injury and blast exposure on the relationship between brain function, cognitive outcomes, and symptom severity in a sample of Iraq and Afghanistan combat veterans. This study will demonstrate how the relationship between aspects of the functional connectome and cognitive function are changed by TBI and blast. Overall, these studies highlight novel approaches to the understanding, assessment, and treatment of TBI being implemented in the Department of Defense and Veterans Affairs that have high applicability to the civilian population.
1 Detection of Cognitive Subtypes Within Cognitively Normal Older Adults Using Hierarchical Community Detection
Authors: Pommy Jessica , Conant Lisa , Butts Alissa , Wang Yang , Nencka Andrew , Franczak Malrgozata , Umfleet Laura Glass 
Published: December 2023

Objective:Identifying individuals at the earliest stages of Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) would enable development and study of interventions prior to onset of symptoms. However, differentiating age-related cognitive changes from subtle pathological changes remains a challenge in the field. Methods that would enable earlier detection of AD in elders with no subjective or objective cognitive concerns (i.e., individuals in the preclinical stage) would be of great interest. Community detection, a metric founded in graph theory, offers an alternative approach for characterizing subtle heterogeneity within aging samples and has the potential to inform cognitive variability in aging.Participants and Methods:Using a hierarchical community detection, we examined whether cognitive subtypes could be identified in 226 cognitively normal older adults (from the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative [ADNI] study). Cognitive profiles of each community were characterized first using MANOVAs to examine the relationship between community membership and 12 age-, gender-, and education-corrected neuropsychological variables. Pair-wise comparisons were examined for significant main effects. We then examined whether these subtypes were related to biomarkers (cortical volumes, fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG)-positron emission tomography (PET) hypometabolism) or clinical progression. All p values were corrected for multiple comparisons.Results:Three communities (i.e., cognitive subtypes) were identified within the healthy aging sample. The first and largest community identified (N = 106) was characterized by a relative weakness on a single measure visuospatial executive function. Both the second (N = 76) and third community (N = 44) scored significantly lower on immediate, delayed, and recognition memory relative to the first community. The third community was characterized by a relative weakness in category fluency and speeded visual sequencing as well (p < .000). The three communities did not differ on age, gender, education, race, or ethnicity. Community membership was associated with entorhinal volume (with the second and third communities having significantly smaller entorhinal volumes than the first community), though community membership was not significantly associated with other biomarkers examined. Conversion rate reached trend level significance at 12 month follow up (more converters in the third community).Conclusions:Hierarchical community detection is an alternative method for characterizing neuropsychological variation and it appears sensitive to relatively small differences that may be observed in a normal aging sample. While the sample size was relatively small, this approach shows promise for potentially leading to earlier detection of cognitive decline among individuals classified to be aging normally (e.g., community 3).