Hop­ing you enjoy this slid­edeck sup­port­ing an impor­tant dis­cus­sion dur­ing the 2019 Sharp­Brains Vir­tu­al Sum­mit: The Future of Brain Health (March 7–9th).  Full record­ings are avail­able for pur­chase here.

3pm‑4.30pm. How to pro­mote brain health at scale: Exam­ples in the work­place, K12 edu­ca­tion and con­sumer tech 

• Louis Gagnon, CEO of Total Brain
• Dr. Gre­go­ry Rose, Direc­tor of the Cen­ter for Inte­grat­ed Research in Cog­ni­tive and Neur­al Sci­ences at SIU Med
• Ariel Garten, Founder and Chief Evan­ge­lism Offi­cer of Inter­aX­on
• Chaired by: Alvaro Fer­nan­dez, CEO and Edi­tor-in-Chief at Sharp­Brains

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We are proud to announce the first wave of con­firmed Speak­ers to share their inno­v­a­tive work and insights at the 2019 Sharp­Brains Vir­tu­al Sum­mit: The Future of Brain Health, to be held May 7–9th, 2019:

Dr. Tom Insel, Co-founder and Pres­i­dent of Mind­strong Health
Dr. Ainslie Hatch, Direc­tor of Dig­i­tal Ther­a­peu­tics at Otsu­ka Phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal
David Klein, CEO of Click Ther­a­peu­tics
Char­lie Hartwell, Oper­at­ing Part­ner at The Bridge Builders Col­lab­o­ra­tive
Louis Gagnon, CEO of Total Brain
Dr. Anna Wexler, sci­ence writer and PI of the Wexler Lab at UPenn
Dr. Eddie Mar­tuc­ci, Founder and CEO of Akili Inter­ac­tive Labs
Ana Maiques, CEO of Neu­ro­electrics
Jan Samzelius, Founder and CEO of Neu­raMetrix
Dr. Peter White­house, Pro­fes­sor of Neu­rol­o­gy at Case West­ern Reserve Uni­ver­si­ty
Kito Toset­ti, CEO of CTF MEG Inter­na­tion­al
Ariel Garten, Founder and Chief Evan­ge­lism Offi­cer of Inter­aX­on
Alvaro Fer­nan­dez, CEO and Edi­tor-in-Chief of Sharp­Brains

We can’t wait to discuss and help shape the Future of Brain Health!

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Imag­ine your smart­phone can detect ear­ly signs of anx­i­ety, depres­sion or Parkinson’s Dis­ease — would you like to know? Who else should know … and not know?

Imag­ine a videogame cleared by the FDA to treat ADHD or sub­stance abuse — how will doc­tors pre­scribe it, patients access it, and insur­ers pay for it?

Imag­ine being respon­si­ble for the health & well­ness of your orga­ni­za­tion — how will you nav­i­gate the grow­ing toolk­it of evi­dence-based inter­ven­tions such as exercise/ meditation/ sleep apps/ cog­ni­tive therapies/ biofeedback/ tDCS?

Imag­ine invest­ing $100 mil­lion to help accel­er­ate brain research and appli­ca­tions — how would you ensure that respon­si­ble devel­op­ment meets wise adop­tion?

Imag­ine a free annu­al brain check-up — who should take it, and how could it help prevent/ delay/ treat cog­ni­tive decline and Alzheimer’s Dis­ease?

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LEARN MORE HERE

Dear col­league,

It’s remark­able how quick­ly things are chang­ing, final­ly, in brain health and men­tal health — see for exam­ple what’s new with Inter­ax­on, Akili, Neu­raMetrix, Apple, Calm, Halo Neu­ro­science, Mind­strong Health, Novar­tis, Pear Ther­a­peu­tics, and life­long neu­ro­ge­n­e­sis, all in the last 6 months!

Please enjoy the May edi­tion of Sharp­Brains eNewslet­ter below, and con­sid­er join­ing the Sharp­Brains Vir­tu­al Sum­mit this Decem­ber to dis­cuss the lat­est and help shape the next 🙂

New research:

• Cog­ni­tive train­ing, diet, exer­cise, and vas­cu­lar man­age­ment seen to improve cog­ni­tion even in peo­ple with genet­ic pre­dis­po­si­tion for demen­tia (APOE e4)
• Brain imag­ing show that patients with Alzheimer’s dis­ease can still remem­ber and enjoy their favorite songs
• Phys­i­cal exer­cise doesn’t slow down demen­tia once it appears, study shows

New tools:

• Ini­tial study finds promise and lim­i­ta­tions in using vir­tu­al real­i­ty (VR) to treat ADHD
• tDCS com­ing to an Equinox gym near you: Good, Bad or Depends?
• Could tech­nol­o­gy help cure depres­sion among old­er adults? (Short answer: Yes)

New thinking:

• Six tips for social-emo­tion­al learn­ing (SEL) to trans­fer into real-world skills
• Large study to assess impact on ear­ly brain devel­op­ment of finan­cial assis­tance to low-income moth­ers
• New book high­lights con­tin­ued brain devel­op­ment through­out ado­les­cence, even into our 20s
• Pre­sen­ta­tion on Neu­ro­science, Edu­ca­tion and Life­long Learn­ing (in Span­ish)

Have a great month of June,

The Sharp­Brains Team

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We are proud to share what’s already shap­ing up to be a quite spec­tac­u­lar and unique Speak­ing Ros­ter at the 2017 Sharp­Brains Vir­tu­al Sum­mit, start­ing with Thomas R. lnsel, MD, a psy­chi­a­trist, neu­ro­sci­en­tist, and cur­rent­ly a co-founder and Pres­i­dent of Mind­strong Health. From 2002–2015, Dr. Insel served as Direc­tor of the Nation­al Insti­tute of Men­tal Health (NIMH), Read the rest of this entry »

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Hun­dreds of com­pa­nies around the globe, now includ­ing Elon Musk’s Neu­ralink and even Face­book,  are research­ing and devel­op­ing new ways to help brain own­ers be smarter, sharp­er, and health­i­er.

What explains this flur­ry of activ­i­ty? Where may it be head­ed?

To help you under­stand what’s going on, let me high­light five key facts that emerged from the recent Sharp­Brains Vir­tu­al Sum­mit.

Fact 1. There are 7.5 billion human brains out there, and everyone needs help

Con­sid­er all unmet needs derived from the tra­di­tion­al phar­ma-exclu­sive approach to brain health.

Learn­ing and cog­ni­tive dis­abil­i­ties in chil­dren are grow­ing sig­nif­i­cant­ly, from ADHD and OCD, to autism. The relat­ed emo­tion­al and eco­nom­ic bur­den is sub­stan­tial — yet, over 60–70% of those with treat­ment have poor out­comes, and many who need help don’t get any.

Glob­al­ly, around 350 mil­lion peo­ple suf­fer from depres­sion. Add to that sub­stance abuse, and we are talk­ing hun­dreds of mil­lions of peo­ple with­out prop­er care and very high relapse rates for the lucky ones get­ting help.

Con­cus­sions and brain impair­ments per­vade through mil­lions of vet­er­ans and high-con­tact sports prac­ti­tion­ers, yet diag­no­sis and treat­ments are elu­sive.

And let’s not for­get the per­fect­ly healthy. Read the rest of this entry »