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Report

Teaser, summary, work performed and final results

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - Eddie (Eddie – smart neurorehabilitation software)

Teaser

Traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) are major public health, medical, and societal challenges globally. In the European Union alone, an estimated 57,000 deaths and 1.5 million hospital admissions annually have been attributed to TBI. This translates to a pooled population...

Summary

Traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) are major public health, medical, and societal challenges globally. In the European Union alone, an estimated 57,000 deaths and 1.5 million hospital admissions annually have been attributed to TBI. This translates to a pooled population mortality rate of 11.7 (and a hospital admission rate of 287.2 per 100,000 persons per year. Nearly a quarter of moderate to severe TBI patients fail to return to work in the year following their injury.
To avoid a chronic phase of disorders, early, long-term, continual, targeted and complex neurorehabilitation for patients is highly required. This burden affects the daily life of survivors and their families; it also has relevant social and economic costs. The complex and effective brain rehabilitative approach includes a cognitive rehabilitation from early stages of onset and continues is subacute stages to supportive rehabilitation stages. The accessible link in following medical stages is highly required and it is varied in each European country.
The missing link could be replaced by inventing a comprehensive cognitive rehabilitation software which shadows a patient form early stages of treatment helps to collect data about the cognitive interventions and supports targeting interventions through medical steps, treatment stages and following healthcare providers.
The key objective of the Feasibility Study is to explore opportunities for Eddie - comprehensive biomedical instrument aimed for cognitive rehabilitation of patients with acquired brain injury.

Work performed

Due to uneasy development of the complex Intelligent neurorehabilitation system, another two parallel solutions which are also meant to be medical devices and alter by the degree of electronic range and software algorithms involvement has been developing.
1. Basic cube solution
Manually administered, the offline Basic solution contains a set of 6 cubes + pad. On each cube sides, various stimuli can be presented (pictures, numbers, characters, shapes, colors, etc.) and the combination with other cubes could be used for targeted personalized cognitive stimulation from early stages of treatment. This solution was developed and within the approval of the ethical committee started to being tested in a clinical environment.
2. Semi-smart cube solution
The prototype of Semi-Smart solution raised up in April 2019 due to uneasy, expensive and prolonged development of the “Intelligent neurorehabilitation system”. The semi-smart solution is based on the idea, the treatment should be objectively evaluated. The solution includes the neurorehabilitation cubes /grounded on Basic cubes./ with basic sensors for movement detection and wireless connection to the smart device as a smartphone or tablets. Thanks to the gyroscope and accelerometer are possible to evaluate the progress in neuromotor connections in the brain and also with precise detection of the state of the cube, like which kind of direction and which kind of the impulse, a picture is used, is possible to set patient-specific treatment and evaluate progress in the rehabilitation. Thanks to wireless connection are handling and manipulation with the device very comfortable and it is possible to use it without any limitations. This innovative device is very intuitive and thanks to real-time biofeedback, makes the treatment more game without lost of therapeutical effect.
3. Intelligent neurorehabilitation system
Development of Intelligent neurorehabilitation system has been ongoing until today and will continue till December 2021. The project is funded by the Technical Agency of Czech Republic /TL02000313/. Passing the key milestones influenced further development:
- Online testing of the diagnostic module to see a psychometric quality was done on a group of healthy adult volunteers. Then a comparison of a diagnostic module in order to neuropsychological tests finalized in August 2019. The key results influenced further development of the diagnostic module.
- By using basic cubes 10 principles based on CHC model of intelligence were defined and tested. Afterwards, all these principles have been turned into electronic form and being tested.
- TUI cubes are in development.
For market research, 4 European countries were selected thanks to their geographical proximity - Germany, Austria, Slovakia and Poland. Market research study consists of two parts - desk research analysis and expert interviews and their insight in the selected countries. There are numerous competitors to Eddie mainly in specialized software solutions. Over 100 neurostimulation and cognition influencing applications were compared. The key result - There is no device currently available on the market which would be similar to technological features EDDIE has.
IP strategy covers two types of price investment plan situation – optimistic and pessimist alternatives. Sale forecast is based on the total number of hospitals in each of the four countries and the Czech Republic´s hospitals were also included. The total number of hospitals was the only accurate and common indicator for all selected countries. The total amount of sold pieces was divided into 5 years. Key result - Simulated optimistic and also pessimistic financial scenarios based on calculation from the total amount of the hospitals in 4 countries and the Czech Republic were still profitable.
The business plan was built on market research and expert’s insights of cognitive rehabilitation within the overall functioning in each selected health care s

Final results

A prototype of Semi-Smart solution based on the idea using a combination of neurorehabilitation cubes /grounded on Basic cubes./ with basic sensors for movement detection and wireless connection to the smart device as a smartphone or tablets. It could be easily used in the early stages of treatment and offer a wide range of variety for later cognitive stimulation. In the frame of a portable solution, the main aspect to conduct cooperation between the neuropsychologist/therapist and patient via medical device, still. This could be an accessible solution for all people who have difficulties to receive a regular cognitive rehabilitation provided in far distant rehabilitation centers.
Furthermore, a high level of scalability for Semi-smart solution was discovered:
1. High task’s variability and its combination could be easily used in the school system not only for children with special educational needs.
2. The key principles of the semi-smart solution, elements of fun and connection to neurofeedback also allows further use in the gaming industry.

Website & more info

More info: https://yakna.cz/eddie/.