participants needed for research study

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mattllee@gmail.com - 24 Jul 2006 20:38 GMT

Hi, I would like to invite you to participate in a research study
conducted by researchers from Carnegie Mellon University and University
of Pittsburgh's Alzheimer's Disease Research Center on the memory
practices of people with Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) or mild
Alzheimer's disease and their caregivers.

We want to investigate how the caregiver, home environment, and
personal strategies support memory and help individuals with MCI and
mild AD maintain everyday functioning.

The results of the study will help clinicians and psychologists gain a
better understanding of how memory can be supported outside the clinic
as well as help inform the design of behavioral and technological
interventions that may help compensate for memory problems and maintain
quality of life.

The study involves two activities. The caregiver and the person with
MCI or AD may choose to participate in one or both of the following
activities:

1. A 30-minute interview with a researcher where the caregiver and the
person with memory impairment will each discuss their daily routines
and how memory problems affect it. You will be paid $25.00 for your
participation in the interview.

2. An observational study where a researcher will observe the caregiver
and the person with memory impairment in their home as you carry out
your daily routines for a few hours on two consecutive days. You will
be paid $75.00 for your participation in the observational study.

We are looking for people with MCI or mild AD living with their
caregivers at home in the Pittsburgh PA area for our study. You will
not need to leave your home to participate; we'll come to you!

If you are interested in participating in any portions of the study or
have any questions, please leave a voicemail at (412)268-9378 for Prof.
Dey or send email me at mllee[at]andrew.cmu.edu as soon as possible so
we can fit you into our schedule.

Just a couple of days ago, one of the reports from the International
Conference on AD asked for more research on technologies that help
people with AD. Please consider taking part of the study if you are in
the Pittsburgh, PA area. If you're not in the Pittsburgh area and are
still interested, please let us know too!

Thanks!
-Matt

Matthew Lee
Ph.D. Student, HCI Institute
Carnegie Mellon University
Research: Designing technologies for people with cognitive impairments

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Dennis P. Harris - 25 Jul 2006 03:47 GMT

> Just a couple of days ago, one of the reports from the International
> Conference on AD asked for more research on technologies that help
> people with AD. Please consider taking part of the study if you are in
> the Pittsburgh, PA area. If you're not in the Pittsburgh area and are
> still interested, please let us know too!

If you understood how stressed for time and how busy caregivers
are, you wouldn't be asking them to do this. If any of them have
a few spare minutes, they are probably trying to rest.

Instead of wasting your time on this project, try putting some
effort into finding a cure.

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Alan Meyer - 30 Jul 2006 03:00 GMT

>> Just a couple of days ago, one of the reports from the International
>> Conference on AD asked for more research on technologies that help
[quoted text clipped - 8 lines]
> Instead of wasting your time on this project, try putting some
> effort into finding a cure.

I don't know the people involved in this study, but I have a
good opinion of Carnegie Mellon University and I suspect that
they're really trying to be helpful there.

There are millions of Alzheimer's caregivers. If 20 or 30 of them
each give 5 hours of their time, that's only 100 or 150 hours of
time that we give to the study. If the study comes up with some
ideas that only help one out of a thousand patients or caregivers,
then it could be beneficial to _thousands_ of people. That's worth
some of our time.

If we think about other illnesses, we'll get an idea of why the kind
of research their doing at CMU can be helpful. We still can't cure
many kinds of infirmity that keep people from walking, but the
people that invented the power chair have done a huge amount
of good for a really large number of people. We still can't cure
many kinds of hearing problems, but the hearing aid does a huge
amount of good. We still can't re-attach or re-grow severed limbs,
but artificial arms, legs, hands, etc., do a huge amount of good.
We can't cure blindness, but the Kurzweil reading machine and
later developments of it have enabled thousands of blind people
to read.

I figure it's going to be some years before we have a cure for
Alzheimer's. In the meantime, if the CMU engineers can come
up with devices and techniques that help patients and caregivers,
I'm 100% for it.

Alan

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