Neurocognitive assessments and sports concussions

By Alvaro Fernandez | February 5, 2009

Con­cus­sion effect ‘spans decades’ (BBC) — “Peo­ple con­cussed in their youth show sub­tle signs of men­tal and phys­i­cal prob­lems even more than 30 years lat­er, say Cana­di­an researchers.” — “Dr Louis de Beau­mont, who led the study, said: “This study shows that the effects of sports con­cus­sions in ear­ly adult­hood per­sist beyond 30 years post-concussion,…

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Cognitive News November-December 2008

By Alvaro Fernandez | December 26, 2008

Here you have sev­er­al recent arti­cles and devel­op­ments wor­thy of atten­tion: 1) Boom times for brain train­ing games (CNN) 2) Nav­i­gat­ing the brain fit­ness land­scape: do’s and don’ts (McK­night’s Long Term Care News) 3) USA Hock­ey and Intel­li­gym (press release) 4) Brain Fit­ness at New York Pub­lic Library (NYPL blog) 5) McDon­nell Foun­da­tion grant har­ness­es cog­ni­tive science…

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Cognitive Assessments: HeadMinder, ANAM, and more

By Alvaro Fernandez | October 20, 2008

Just saw a very inter­est­ing press release regard­ing com­put­er-based neu­rocog­ni­tive assess­ments — a crit­i­cal part of the brain fit­ness puz­zle. How long will it take before con­sumers can have access to a reli­able and cred­i­ble annu­al “men­tal check-up”/ cog­ni­tive base­line? Head­Min­der Cog­ni­tive Sta­bil­i­ty Index: Com­put­er­ized Neu­rocog­ni­tive … (Press release) — “The Head­Min­der web-based Cog­ni­tive Stability…

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The Cognitive Health and Fitness Market On The Move

By Alvaro Fernandez | October 10, 2008 |

As you have prob­a­bly seen, the Cog­ni­tive Health and Brain Fit­ness field is rapid­ly evolv­ing, so let me high­light some of the main recent devel­op­ments affect­ing the field: 1) Pub­lic pol­i­cy ini­tia­tives:  — The Gov­ern­ment of Ontario, Cana­da, announced a $10m invest­ment in Bay­crest Research Cen­ter to help devel­op and com­mer­cial­ize brain fit­ness tech­nolo­gies. This $10m…

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Computerized Cognitive Assessments: opportunities and concerns

By Alvaro Fernandez | July 14, 2008 |

You know your weight. And your phys­i­cal fit­ness. And a vari­ety of health-relat­ed met­rics. What about your brain fit­ness? Two recent announce­ments bring out how the assess­ment of cog­ni­tive abil­i­ties, or brain func­tions, is increas­ing­ly being done thanks to new com­put­er­ized options: 1) Last week, OptumHealth announced an exclu­sive 3‑year agree­ment (esti­mat­ed at $18m) with…

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