̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge - phone

Can your phone double up as your life-coach?

fpjl2 — Sat, 29 Dec 2012 08:00:01 +0000

On January 1^st, millions of people will wake up with their sore heads full of New Year resolutions to achieve more fulfilling, less stressful lives. Now, researchers are developing a data-gathering mobile platform to help identify the causes of stress for individuals and encourage people to build healthier, happier lifestyles - something that could become a preventative measure for a huge number of medical conditions.

Between use of a phone’s inbuilt sensors and monitoring from local sources, the Android Remote Sensing app, or AIRS, can gather a huge amount of data - from environmental aspects such as location, weather, noise levels, even vicinity devices to gauge crowds, to social aspects such as calendar events and communication spikes in email, text and calls - providing a startlingly informed account of a person’s day.

This automatic recording is coupled with the ability to add emotional data by updating your mood through a series of emoticons, along with text annotations. ECG or heart rate sensors can also be used to show physiological reactions.

All this feeds into a person’s unique life “narrative” to determine what the researchers describe as “meaningful events” - those combinations which trigger stress and strong emotion.

“By steering people to become self-aware of stress and activity management, systems such as AIRS may be able to help people before they develop health problems in later life, when costly treatments are required with limited success,” said Dr Dirk Trossen, technical manager of the project at Cambridge’s Computer Laboratory.

“ ̽��ֱ��time before prescribed medicine is critical in prevention and cutting costs for health services. This requires close monitoring and awareness of lifestyle on the part of individuals - so if the ubiquitous phone in your pocket can also assist with better living in general it’s a win/win situation.”

AIRS provides essential input for the desktop-based MyRoR platform for lifestyle management, developed by Dana Pavel from the ̽��ֱ�� of Essex’s School of Computer Science, as part of the wider PAL project. ̽��ֱ��project - funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council and the Technology Strategy Board - is investigating personal and social communication services for health and lifestyle monitoring.

̽��ֱ��MyRoR platform correlates this information and delivers it as an easy to digest blog-style timeline, allowing the user to detect spikes in various activities and surroundings - and their relation to the diarised emotional values and physiological symptoms of stress.

̽��ֱ��outputs from Pavel’s MyRoR platform are sets of sharable graphics that provide a user-friendly entry into the complex data, offering the “essence” of the individual’s day or week. “ ̽��ֱ��graphics, or media objects, that present the visual story are a more natural way of representing the dense information, bringing it all together in a fun, concise and engaging way,” said Dana Pavel, from Essex’s School of Computer Science. “These stories allow users to hone in on what’s important, the situations with most meaning.”

Users can then employ the AIRS app to craft lifestyle approaches that help flatten stress levels - such as automatic settings that suspend email and calls at key points to create pockets of calm in the day - which can continue beyond initial physical monitoring to support a more balanced life.

There have been a number of user tests - with both ECG monitoring and just the smartphone app - and feedback from users has been positive. “ ̽��ֱ��platform gives people the opportunity to step outside their lives and analyse in-depth contextual data from their day to day existence - an important chance for serious reflection on aspects of daily life that are impacting perhaps without even realising,” said Trossen.

Importantly for the researchers, given the personal nature of the data, information security and software transparency have been paramount. All personal data is stored locally, and is wiped if a phone is stolen and unlocked, and the app has been made ‘open source’ - with all hard coding accessible - and freely available through Google Play.

“This kind of assisted living though mobile technologies is in its infancy, but it is essential that solutions adapt to people, not the other way around, said Trossen.

“Systems should enhance lives and help involve individuals in the information that is having an impact on them every minute.”

For more information, please contact Dirk Trossen on dt355@cam.ac.uk

Researchers are developing a smartphone platform that enables careful monitoring of lifestyle to pinpoint and help avert triggers for stress and negative emotion.

If the ubiquitous phone in your pocket can also assist with better living in general it’s a win/win situation.

Dirk Trossen

AIRS widgets on the Android home screen

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Yes

Therapy over the phone as effective as face-to-face

gm349 — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 22:02:50 +0000

A new study reveals that cognitive therapy over the phone is just as effective as meeting face-to-face. ̽��ֱ��research was published today, 28 September, in the journal PLOS ONE.

Researchers at the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge together with the National Institute for Health Research Collaboration for Leadership in Applied Health Research & Care (NIHR CLAHRC) and NHS Midlands & East also found that providing talking therapy over the phone increases access to psychological therapies for people with common mental disorders and potentially saves the NHS money.

For the study, data from 39,000 patients in seven established Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) services (an initiative which aims to expand the availability of psychological therapies) in the East of England were used to compare Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) delivered face-to-face versus over the phone. For all but an infrequent, identifiable clinical group with more severe illness, therapy over the phone was as effective as face to face, and the cost per session was 36.2% lower.

Patients may be unable to access health servicesdue to transport problems, work commitments and physical disability, among many reasons. So increasing availability of talking therapies over the phone will make mental health services more accessible to patients.

On the back of the study results, NHS Midlands & East has instigated a regional training programme to standardise service delivery and ensure therapists are competent at phone contacts. ̽��ֱ��training programme has recently been extended into a partnership with a third party organisation.

Professor Peter Jones, Principal Investigator of the study from the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge, said: “Providing therapy over the phone will not only help individuals gain much-needed access to mental health treatment, it will provide a more cost effective way of providing these services at a time when we have to be innovative and efficient.”

Mental health illnesses affect one in four adults in Britain every year. Additionally, the NHS spends more on mental health than it does on cancer, heart disease, stroke and asthma put together (a total of £9.95 billion in 2010-2011), with general practitioners spending more than a third of their time on mental health issues.

About IAPT:

̽��ֱ��IAPT programme arose from a national desire to improve access to talking therapies for common mental health problems. It targets mild to moderate depression and anxiety which are the commonest mental health problems seen in general practice, causing an enormous health burden at the population level. People with common mental health problems have been subject to a long and uncertain wait for treatment via the NHS and so the introduction of IAPT services takes a significant step towards widening access to mental health services.

Professor Jones added: “ ̽��ֱ��beauty of the IAPT programme is that it places the patient at the centre of their care and enables research to be used as a tool to support this.”

In the IAPT programme, patients complete a number of disorder-specific questionnaires at every contact with the therapist, which provide accurate information that is used to their individual treatment and a platform of routine outcomes data to inform service improvements.

Throughout the implementation of IAPT in this region, the CLAHRC (a collaboration between the ̽��ֱ�� of Cambridge and the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust) and NHS Midlands & East have worked in close partnership to ensure the programme meets local population need and improves patient care by effectively translating research into practice. Monthly meetings between researchers, commissioners, managers and clinicians meant that all relevant groups were involved in defining the research questions and interpreting the data, enabling them to share best practice and “pull through” the findings into service provision. Moreover, the work of the CLAHRC has shown the power of sharing routine health data by enabling the outcome data to be looked at in a meaningful way to provide feedback to local services on how they can see patients more effectively and achieve better value for money.

Phone therapy also increases access and potentially decreases costs.

Providing therapy over the phone will not only help individuals gain much-needed access to mental health treatment, it will provide a more cost effective way of providing these services at a time when we have to be innovative and efficient.

Professor Peter Jones

Willy D from Flickr

Phone

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Yes

Sing for the win

bjb42 — Sun, 22 Jul 2012 05:00:55 +0000

A new game for the iPhone and iPad called SingSmash is taking an innovative approach to familiarising people with music theory - by sneaking it through the backdoor.

Gamers have to sing into their phone or tablet. By hitting the required note at the right moment, a chunk of translucent wall is briefly rendered impermeable - hopefully in time to bounce a constantly moving ball back at the opposite side, knocking out blocks to progress to increasingly complex levels.

Released today, the game - which is like a handheld mash-up of a brightly coloured ‘Pong’ and an exacting, stripped-down ‘Rock Band’ - was developed by MPhil student Charlie Williams from the Centre for Music and Science as a response to his experiences of teaching music.

Using the game format, the app gets people stretching their vocal chords to ricochet the ball back at opposing blocks - while stealthily introducing them to notation by telling them what they’ve just sung.

“I didn’t want to put theory up front and scare people by stating ‘Now try and sing a harmonic minor scale’ - which can sound pretty daunting,” says Williams. “But if you beat a level, then you find out ‘Guess what? You’ve just sung a harmonic minor scale!’ - people can start to gain confidence, recognise notes and even discover talents with voice and pitch they may have never realised they possess.”

Williams feels that the way a lot of music is taught to beginners can often miss the point: that the first and most important thing with music is to have a go. He hopes SingSmash will help people overcome self-consciousness and get them to do just that, singing an increasingly adventurous series of notes and even licks as they progress.

“In many music lessons, you learn the names for things first and then you learn how to do it - which seems completely backwards and can put people off. When I teach music I try to emphasise actually doing it first, and I wanted to build a game to encourage that and make it fun, while slipping in the educational aspect so that if people want to build on skills they develop through the game then they can,” says Williams.

SingSmash uses inbuilt algorithms and pitch detectors to match the incoming sound to the best fit note within a broad but specified spectrum. To help people stay within the right range, the background music and in-game sounds - such as the collision noise - subtly match the notes of each level.

There is also a cunning secret feature - known in the gaming industry as an ‘Easter egg’ - which gives you a helping hand if you sing in a certain way, although Williams is keen not to spoil the surprise.

̽��ֱ��game starts at a basic level and is very kid-friendly, but employs increasingly complex musical motifs as players advance through the game - to the point where the beta-testers Williams used have yet to crack the hardest level with their voice alone.

“You can play SingSmash using an instrument too, and my most enthusiastic beta-testers said they could only beat the top level with guitar. To my knowledge, no-one has managed to beat it just by singing as yet, so that’s a challenge right there!”

̽��ֱ��app was built by Williams - who has gone from classically trained musician to self-confessed “tech-head” - in collaboration with musician Emma Hooper and graphic artist Jeff Kulak. It will initially cost 69p to download, a decision the team was reluctant to take, but, as Williams points out, “we are desperate to spend more time making games, and that takes money”.

Potential future projects include creating multi-player versions of the game and adapting it to incorporate rhythmic exercises. One of the important aspects for Williams is that SingSmash promotes the making of music, not just emulating pre-existing music. “Most music games - such as ‘Rock Band’ - are imitative. They are really fun games but with SingSmash you are actually making music for yourself,” he says.

“A lot of people who are self-taught are adverse to music theory, it can seem elitist and put people off. I’m hoping that people who play guitar in a band or whatever can use this as a fun way to build up their skills and explore new musical patterns.

“You don’t have to sing nicely, you just have to sing on the pitch - I hope this app will encourage people to not be so self-conscious and just make some noise. ̽��ֱ��best thing about kids is they just go for it right away, people are so worried about doing something wrong - this app is almost like a trick that might get adults to forget they are actually singing!”

A new app game developed by a Cambridge student challenges people to sing the right note at the right time in order to smash down a wall and advance to the next level - surreptitiously engaging them with basic music theory at the same time.

I hope this app will encourage people to not be so self-conscious and just make some noise.

Charlie Williams

Toby Farrell for Watershed Bristol

Testing Sing Smash

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Yes