Mind Project Research Articles

Applying a multicentre, interdisciplinary approach to strengthen the generalisability of qualitative dementia research: the experience and challenges faced by the MinD project in Europe

Background: Generalisation of findings is an important aspect of research and essential for evidence-based practice. While generalisation is common in quantitative research, there is a lack of generalisability in qualitative research. This paper presents the experience and challenges faced by the Designing for People with Dementia (MinD) project in meeting the requirements to strengthen the generalisation of findings on the lived experience of people living with dementia and their engagement to co-create designs to empower their everyday living. Methods: Polit and Beck (2010)’s strategies to generalise qualitative findings were applied: (1) replication in sampling; (2) replication of studies; (3) meta-synthesis of findings; (4) reflexivity and conceptualization; (5) immersion with the data; and (6) thick description.Results: While it is possible to increase the generabilisabilty of qualitative evidence through the replication of the sampling to attain a large, heterogeneous sample in different and multiple contexts and environments; implementation of sound and robust research; conducting in-depth analysis and interpretation collaboratively for emergent themes; and meeting the thick description requirement, there are challenges that the project team faced in implementing some of the Polit and Beck’s strategies because of the condition, namely dementia, that our participants are having. Other challenges faced were: the language and culturaldiversity in the team; diverse work and organisational procedures; and the inter-disciplinary differences relating to the methods of enquiry, approaches and techniques to conduct research. These challenges will need to be identified and addressed at the start of the project with a strong leadership to ensure a seamless journey to complete the project successfully.Trust between the researchers and participants, and time to build this trust are critical to recruitment and participation in the study; these factors are of utmost important in research involving participants with condition such as dementia.

Monitoring health parameter of remotely located patient

As we know in this pandemic situation social distancing is key to be safe. So, we have to keep safe distance in every situation whether it’s working site or in providing service to people. For this situation most important service required by the people is medical. So, we have to style a module which help hospitals to provide implementation to this problem. By keeping this situation in mind project for hospital is going to design. Basically, in this project we are going to measure and monitor the heath parameter of patient like temperature, heartbeat, blood pressure, blood sugar level etc. Those sensed value will be either send directly to controller (Arduino) or will be added to GUI and then send to controller. Then this value will be sent over WIFI network and store in database so that those value can be access whenever patient has appointment by doctor’s side system. By implementing this project no Doctor or patient will have direct interaction, to avoid spreading of dangerous virus. Advantage of this system is that Dr. can access patient health parameter at any time and can medicate his patient.

Peace of Mind project: an integrated model to improve the end-of-life journey for patients with dementia

The International Journal of Integrated Care (IJIC) is an online, open-access, peer-reviewed scientific journal that publishes original articles in the field of integrated care on a continuous basis.IJIC has an Impact Factor of 5.120 (2020 JCR, received in June 2021)The IJIC 20th Anniversary Issue was published in 2021.

A space expedition for early elementary and preschool

“A Space Expedition for early elementary and preschool” is a course and a set of activities based on active-inquiry learning. Through the one-day course teachers of young learners are encouraged to create settings for the children to become, and remain, curious and inquisitive. The activities are created with a larger theme project in mind; they can be used in any order, depending on the interests of the learners. The children's role in choosing the topics is essential throughout the course, as the intention is to allow the children to pursue their interests, and hence lead the project forwards. The teachers are encouraged to reflect on personal experiences and ideas together with the children to ensure a feeling of ethos and purpose, and help the children contemplate on their own educational values. All activities and resources used in this course are created by Andøya Space Education.

Nielsen’s Unrealised Opera Plans

In addition to the two finished operas of Nielsen, scattered sources show that throughout his life he had at least five other opera projects in mind, which for various reasons were given up at different stages in their progress. The article presents the sources that are available for these projects, comprising the following works: Judith, Psycke, The Silent Woman, Portia, and Fru Marie Grubbe. The focus of the article is on Nielsen’s plan to compose an opera based on Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice under the working title Portia. Two important manuscripts in the Royal Library show that Nielsen himself had worked out a complete synopsis for the opera, and that the librettist, Sophus Michaëlis, had made a full text of the first act. A comparison of the two manuscripts and Shakespeare’s play reveals that the opera would have been quite different from the model with its focus on the character of Portia and the leaving out the merchant Antonio. Nielsen apparently gave up the idea, and no music from the work in progress worth mentioning is known.

Effect of a Cognitive Training Program on the Platelet APP Ratio in Patients with Alzheimer's Disease.

In patients with Alzheimer’s disease (AD), synaptic plasticity seems to be involved in cognitive improvement induced by cognitive training. The platelet amyloid precursor protein (APP) ratio (APPr), i.e., the ratio between two APP isoforms, may be a useful peripheral biomarker to investigate synaptic plasticity pathways. This study evaluates the changes in neuropsychological/cognitive performance and APPr induced by cognitive training in AD patients participating in the “My Mind Project”. Neuropsychological/cognitive variables and APPr were evaluated in the trained group (n = 28) before a two-month experimental protocol, immediately after its termination at follow-up 1 (FU1), after 6 months at follow-up 2 (FU2), and after 24 months at follow-up 3 (FU3). The control group (n = 31) received general psychoeducational training for two months. Some memory and attention parameters were significantly improved in trained vs. control patients at FU1 and FU2 compared to baseline (Δ values). At FU3, APPr and Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) scores decreased in trained patients. Δ APPr correlated significantly with the Δ scores of (i) MMSE at FU1, (ii) the prose memory test at FU2, and (iii) Instrumental Activities of Daily Living (IADL), the semantic word fluency test, Clinical Dementia Rating (CDR), and the attentive matrices test at FU3. Our data demonstrate that the platelet APPr correlates with key clinical variables, thereby proving that it may be a reliable biomarker of brain function in AD patients.

“Charming Eyes”: Exploring Agency through the Beauty and Makeup Practices of Salesladies in Metropolitan Manila’s Department Stores

An examination of the role and meaning of beauty and makeup practices among the salesladies of Metropolitan Manila’s department stores brings forth a worker-centered analysis of “agency” using the notion of “charming eyes.” Here, we find an intimate blending of the practices of working as a saleslady: how compliance with the company’s “appearance rules” and “beauty standards” serve the interests of retail businesses and are not merely expressions of individuality. Simultaneously, this analysis addresses concerns about working and pursuing their goals, desires, and aspirations in life. Through the ethnographic approach, this study was comprehensively contextualized through the everyday lived experiences of acting subjects within the setting, thereby capturing their rich voices. Data sources include interviews, life narratives, observations, photo documentation, material object analysis, and secondary research. I argue that the emergence of “agency” is context specific: to reveal “agency” is to understand the context and how practices correspond with the limits and possibilities therein. The salesladies’ “agency” was manifested in the beauty and makeup practices as they enacted work with their respective mobility—social, cultural, economic—projects in mind. This view subverts the usual low-pay, low-status, and lowprestige associations of the occupation. As a counter-narrative, the article shows a specific group of workers making sense of their work conditions as they try to meaningfully engage its constraints and transform their lives on their terms (Ortner 2006).

A retrospective survey on evaluating an enrichment program for socioeconomically disadvantaged gifted students

The Bright Mind Project, sponsored by Morgan Stanley Taiwan and Chinese Association of Gifted Education, was launched in 2004 and ended in 2018. With scholarships, living subsidies, enrichment courses, and counseling provided, this project was tailored for gifted senior high students of socioeconomically disadvantaged families in Taiwan. After the project ended in 2018, a retrospective tracking study was conducted to understand the students’ feedback on the project. The findings suggest that students hold a positive attitude toward the project and think it is of great help to their academic performances at school and future careers. They also believe that, with the resources obtained from the project, they have broadened their horizons, enriched their life experiences, and adopted a positive attitude toward life. Finally, students also provided suggestions for the future project like this based on their personal experiences.

Writing History

Writing History

Digital Literacy and Liberative Community Engagement

AbstractHow can institutions really open up and promote their archival collections through creative interventions? This question was posed when devising the In Our Minds project, a collaborative project between The National Archives U.K. and University for the Creative Arts (UCA) Archive, U.K. This article reflects on digital literacy as a means to create content and use digital platforms to engage, promote and disseminate information as part of the project's aims and outcomes. It also assesses how creative interventions can open up and increase awareness to certain collections through the defined theme of mental health, by individual creative practitioners, and developing exhibition strategies for a touring exhibition with physical and digital artworks.

Index to Titles and Authors/Editors of Books Reviewed

Index to Titles and Authors/Editors of Books Reviewed

Parallel distributed networks dissociate episodic and social functions within the individual.

Association cortex is organized into large-scale distributed networks. One such network, the default network (DN), is linked to diverse forms of internal mentation, opening debate about whether shared or distinct anatomy supports multiple forms of cognition. Using within-individual analysis procedures that preserve idiosyncratic anatomical details, we probed whether multiple tasks from two domains, episodic projection and theory of mind (ToM), rely on the same or distinct networks. In an initial experiment (6 subjects, each scanned 4 times), we found evidence that episodic projection and ToM tasks activate separate regions distributed throughout the cortex, with adjacent regions in parietal, temporal, prefrontal, and midline zones. These distinctions were predicted by the hypothesis that the DN comprises two parallel, interdigitated networks. One network, linked to parahippocampal cortex (PHC), is preferentially recruited during episodic projection, including both remembering and imagining the future. A second juxtaposed network, which includes the temporoparietal junction (TPJ), is differentially engaged during multiple forms of ToM. In two prospectively acquired independent experiments, we replicated and triplicated the dissociation (each with 6 subjects scanned 4 times). Furthermore, the dissociation was found in all zones when analyzed independently, including robustly in midline regions previously described as hubs. The TPJ-linked network is interwoven with the PHC-linked network across the cortex, making clear why it is difficult to fully resolve the two networks in group-averaged or lower-resolution data. These results refine our understanding of the functional-anatomical organization of association cortex and raise fundamental questions about how specialization might arise in parallel, juxtaposed association networks.NEW & NOTEWORTHY Two distributed, interdigitated networks exist within the bounds of the canonical default network. Here we used repeated scanning of individuals, across three independent samples, to provide evidence that tasks requiring episodic projection or theory of mind differentially recruit the two networks across multiple cortical zones. The two distributed networks thus appear to preferentially subserve distinct functions.

Tango Dancing with María Lugones

Tango Dancing with María Lugones

Choreographic transductions across media: problems and objects in the Double Skin/Double Mind project

O foco deste artigo é a individuação de conhecimento coreográfico no contexto do projecto Double Skin/Double Mind, desenvolvido pelo grupo de investigação Prática e Desenvolvimento Artístico, da Escola das Artes de Amesterdão, em torno do trabalho conjunto do coreógrafo e bailarino Emio Greco e do drama‑ turgista Pieter Scholten. O artigo expõe alguns problemas associados à concepção e ao desenho de uma série de objectos multimédia, criados com o intuito de transmitir o conhecimento coreográfico destes artistas através de estruturas análogas aos conceitos organizadores das próprias danças. Estes conceitos cor‑ respondem a princípios de movimento cuja transmissão se dá por meio de transducções, tanto entre corpos como entre diferentes média. A transducção é aqui proposta como uma operação adequada ao pensamento da transmissão coreográfica, abrangendo tanto as expressões intensivas e extensivas da dança como os processos abstractos e concretos pelos quais o conhecimento que lhe está associado emerge. Os problemas abordados referem‑se sobretudo à disparidade entre a dança e a escrita coreográfica, vista da perspectiva da diferença entre multiplicidades qualitativas e multiplicidades quantitativas. O projecto de investigação Double Skin/Double Mind debruçou‑se sobre este conjunto de problemas no que respeita à transmissão de conhecimento coreográfico em tempos de multimodalidade digital, não sem ter de lidar com as restrições diagramáticas e linguísticas necessárias à determinação de uma continuidade de ideias coreográficas através de corpos e média descontínuos. DANÇA / COREOGRAFIA / CONHECIMENTO / TRANSDUÇÃO / MULTIMÉDIA

Deakin Interviews Author of "Fake News and Dinosaurs"

Deakin Interviews Author of "Fake News and Dinosaurs"

MVP RCT: Mind and Voice Project Randomized Control Trial

MVP RCT: Mind and Voice Project Randomized Control Trial

Identification of clinically related requirements of a novel assistive device for people with a high spinal cord injury.

People with spinal cord injuries (SCI), and particularly with high level lesions, can potentially lose the ability to effectively operate computers. The Multimedia Authoring and Management using your Eyes and Mind (MAMEM) project aims to design and produce a novel assistive device to support computer use by individuals with SCI and other disabilities. The solution harnesses eye tracking and brain waves, as measured by encephalography (EEG), to manipulate common computer functions. This paper describes the first step in the project, during which we defined clinically related requirements of the assistive device. These definitions were based on data from three sources: (1) a narrative review; (2) a focus group of SCI rehabilitation professionals; and (3) structured questionnaires administrated to potential computer users with SCI, addressing computer-use habits, barriers, and needs. We describe both the collection of data from each source and the clinically related requirements extracted. The novel three-source requirement assessment method is discussed, and the advantages and disadvantages of each data source are reported. In conclusion, we suggest that this approach makes it possible to organize, discuss, and prioritize the requirements, and to create a work program while planning the device. This increases our level of certainty that the efficacy and adequacy of the assistive device will be maximized, in terms of the clinical needs of users.

Improving youth mental wellness services in an Indigenous context in Ulukhaktok, Northwest Territories: ACCESS Open Minds Project.

AimTo describe a community‐specific and culturally coherent approach to youth mental health services in a small and remote northern Indigenous community in Canada's Northwest Territories, under the framework of ACCESS Open Minds (ACCESS OM), a pan‐Canadian youth mental health research and evaluation network.MethodsAs 1 of the 14 Canadian communities participating in a 5‐year, federally funded service transformation and evaluation project, the arctic Inuit community of Ulukhaktok has undertaken culturally relevant adjustments in their delivery of youth mental wellness services and related community wellness initiatives. These enhancement activities highlight connections to culture and traditional skills, honour youth‐ and community‐expressed desires to incorporate Inuvialuit‐specific approaches to wellness, and strengthen the support systems to improve access to mainstream mental healthcare, when needed. The adaptation of a Lay Health Worker model from Global Mental Health to the local circumstances resulting in creation of lay community health workers is central to this approach in meeting contextual needs.ResultsCommunity leaders identified key activities for sustainable change, including human capital development, authentic collaboration and diversified engagement strategies. Building around five ACCESS OM objectives, the local site team in Ulukhaktok has identified its youth programming and mental wellness service gaps through an ongoing process of community mapping.ConclusionsInformation from service providers, youth and other community members demonstrates attuning of the ACCESS OM framework to Inuit paradigms in Ulukhaktok. It could prove to be a sustainable prototype for delivering youth mental health services in other communities in the Inuvialuit Settlement Region and possibly across the entire Inuit Nunangat. It needs, however, to be further supported by easier access to specialized mental health services when needed.

Engineered extremes: microbial interactions with steel and bentonite in a geological disposal facility

The conditions of the deep subsurface, combined by perturbations caused by geological disposal of radioactive waste create multiple extreme conditions (limited space availability, high pH, high temperature etc.) for microbial communities. Microbial activity has the potential to cause corrosion of steel and alteration of bentonite clays used in geological disposal facilities. To understand the limits on microbial growth, and the potential for microbial activity to affect the swelling behaviour of the bentonite and metal corrosion, a suite of laboratory experiments is being conducted. In situ repository conditions have been replicated in the MIND (Horizon2020) project. Preliminary results show evidence of corrosion in all experiments, an increase in the basal spacings of smectites in the zone immediately surrounding the steel and inoculated samples had evidence of calcite crystal formation, accompanied by differences in the iron phases. These experiments simulate the in situ conditions well, but the complex nature of this experimental design (high pressure and flow) reduces the practicality of varying the environmental conditions. To complement these investigations, a low-tech solution has been implemented with unpressurised, hydrated bentonite batch experiments. The simpler nature of this set-up allows for investigation of more parameters. Microcosms with artificial groundwater used in the MIND set-up are being compared to the MIND groundwater composition, modelled to represent permafrost conditions. The effect of incubation temperature is also being investigated. Combined, these experiments will help to understand the influence of microbes under the extremes of geological disposal facilities and how their behaviour may change by external parameters.

Association of Apolipoprotein E With Intracerebral Hemorrhage Risk by Race/Ethnicity

Genetic studies of intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH) have focused mainly on white participants, but genetic risk may vary or could be concealed by differing nongenetic coexposures in nonwhite populations. Transethnic analysis of risk may clarify the role of genetics in ICH risk across populations. To evaluate associations between established differences in ICH risk by race/ethnicity and the variability in the risks of apolipoprotein E (APOE) ε4 alleles, the most potent genetic risk factor for ICH. This case-control study of primary ICH meta-analyzed the association of APOE allele status on ICH risk, applying a 2-stage clustering approach based on race/ethnicity and stratified by a contributing study. A propensity score analysis was used to model the association of APOE with the burden of hypertension across race/ethnic groups. Primary ICH cases and controls were collected from 3 hospital- and population-based studies in the United States and 8 in European sites in the International Stroke Genetic Consortium. Participants were enrolled from January 1, 1999, to December 31, 2017. Participants with secondary causes of ICH were excluded from enrollment. Controls were regionally matched within each participating study. Clinical variables were systematically obtained from structured interviews within each site. APOE genotype was centrally determined for all studies. In total, 13 124 participants (7153 [54.5%] male with a median [interquartile range] age of 66 [56-76] years) were included. In white participants, APOE ε2 (odds ratio [OR], 1.49; 95% CI, 1.24-1.80; P < .001) and APOE ε4 (OR, 1.51; 95% CI, 1.23-1.85; P < .001) were associated with lobar ICH risk; however, within self-identified Hispanic and black participants, no associations were found. After propensity score matching for hypertension burden, APOE ε4 was associated with lobar ICH risk among Hispanic (OR, 1.14; 95% CI, 1.03-1.28; P = .01) but not in black (OR, 1.02; 95% CI, 0.98-1.07; P = .25) participants. APOE ε2 and ε4 did not show an association with nonlobar ICH risk in any race/ethnicity. APOE ε4 and ε2 alleles appear to affect lobar ICH risk variably by race/ethnicity, associations that are confirmed in white individuals but can be shown in Hispanic individuals only when the excess burden of hypertension is propensity score-matched; further studies are needed to explore the interactions between APOE alleles and environmental exposures that vary by race/ethnicity in representative populations at risk for ICH.