Journey through the Cortex

New Training Program for Auditory Processing Disorder

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Mon, 03 Jun 2013 06:32:16 PDT

Diagram of human brain showing surface gyri and the primary auditory cortex Angular Gyrus Supramarginal Gyrus Broca's Area Wernicke's Area Primary Auditory Cortex (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

New program for auditory processing disorder developed by some of the big dogs in the field. Wonder how it stacks up against Brain Fitness or Fast forward?

Based on a wealth of empirical evidence on the neuroscience, diagnosis and treatment of central auditory processing disorder (CAPD), Sound Auditory Training (SAT) is a soon-to-be-available new web-based program designed to train auditory processing skills in children, adults, and older adults with CAPD as well as other clinical populations, such as patients with cochlear implants. Developed by Drs. Chermak, Musiek and Weihing, SAT makes available well controlled stimuli that can be customized to exercise a number of fundamental auditory skills. In addition to training, it provides clinicians with a tool-set to design one’s own training tasks and evaluate auditory skills, and provides clinical scientists with highly accessible stimuli to design psychoacoustic procedures. While the developers offer general guidelines for selecting specific tasks and setting parameters based on clinical profiles, SAT is not a program nor is it a test. Rather, SAT is a tool-set that includes adaptable auditory stimuli, a range of auditory tasks, and engaging graphic interfaces to meet the clinical or research needs of the professional.

Sound Auditory Training relies on adaptive algorithms (i.e., the program changes in response to the user’s performance), flexible feedback to the user (via animations or counters), and flexible parameter settings for the clinician/clinical scientist, parents, educators, and users. Tasks train intensity, frequency, and temporal detection, discrimination, and identification using a variety of non-verbal (e.g., tones, noise) and minimally loaded verbal stimuli (e.g., consonant-vowel syllables). Immediate feedback (error correction and reinforcement) is provided through animations within the game. Skills are practiced intensively until they become habitual and automatic. The exercises are sequenced to challenge but not overwhelm the participant. The clinician can use the software to obtain a more comprehensive profile of an individual’s skill strengths and skill deficits in order to more efficiently and effectively target and train deficit areas on a variety of auditory tasks.

In addition to its usefulness to clinical professionals, SAT is designed to be accessible to parents and teachers so that the exercises can be administered in a non-clinical environment. It is also designed to meet the needs of researchers to serve as a tool for investigation of auditory psychophysics, especially with children. The flexibility of the program allows updates based in research and thus promotes evidence-based practice. It provides auditory training exercises that encompass a wide range of auditory processing skills. Most important, SAT exercises auditory skills which are most likely to have a meaningful impact on a person’s listening, communication, and learning. Anticipated release date is August 2013 but you can contact Plural Publishing for more information and a web-based trial package

http://www.pluralpublishing.com/wp/?p=1252

Posted with Blogsy

Misaligned Teeth, Bad Posture and Eye Problems

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Sat, 01 Jun 2013 05:04:06 PDT

Human eye. Español: Iris de un ojo humano. El ojo recibe los rayos de luz que provienen del exterior y los transforma en impulsos nerviosos en la retina, formada por las células de la visión conocidas como conos y bastones. فارسی: چشم انسان Français : Œil humain Italiano: Occhio umano. ქართული: ადამიანის თვალი Русский: Глаз человека Türkçe: İnsan Gözu 中文: 人眼 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Someone has finally put together an article on how your head and body alignment affect posture. Apparently poorly aligned teeth (overbite, cross bite, etc) affect the alignment of the head because of the misalignment of the mandible, one of the links in the muscular chain, leading to hyper-contraction of the masticatory muscles . This tension forces the rest of the body to react, imposing postural modifications brought about by the contraction of other muscles in the chain. Misalignment of the mandible can also cause the position of the pupillary line to be momentarily altered, provoking the intervention of ocular muscles to keep the gaze straight.

Apparently, the alignment of your feet, hips, shoulders are important,too.

The study shows that there is correlation between a deep bite or over bite, dysmetric legs or gait, and exophoria or esophoria (eyes pointing outwards or inwards).

http://www.biomedcentral.com/content/pdf/1471-2431-13-12.pdf

Beauty is in the medial orbito-frontal cortex of the beholder

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Fri, 31 May 2013 02:00:00 PDT

English: Transverse section of the caudate nucleus from a structural MR image. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A region at the front of the brain 'lights up' when we experience beauty in a piece of art or a musical excerpt, according to new research funded by the Wellcome Trust. The study, published July 6 in the open access journal PLoS One, suggests that the one characteristic that all works of art, whatever their nature, have in common is that they lead to activity in that same region of the brain, and goes some way to supporting the views of David Hume and others that beauty lies in the beholder rather than in the object.

"The question of whether there are characteristics that render objects beautiful has been debated for millennia by artists and philosophers of art but without an adequate conclusion," says Professor Semir Zeki from the Wellcome Laboratory of Neurobiology at UCL (University College London). "So too has the question of whether we have an abstract sense of beauty, that is to say one which arouses in us the same powerful emotional experience regardless of whether its source is, for example, musical or visual. It was time for neurobiology to tackle these fundamental questions."

...

Professor Zeki and colleague Dr Tomohiro Ishizu found that an area at the front of the brain known as the medial orbito-frontal cortex, part of the pleasure and reward centre of the brain, was more active in subjects when they listened to a piece of music or viewed a picture which they had previously rated as beautiful. By contrast, no particular region of the brain correlated generally with artwork previously rated 'ugly,' though the experience of visual ugliness when contrasted with the experience of beauty did correlate with activation in a number of regions.

The medial orbito-frontal cortex has previously been linked to appreciation of beauty, but this is the first time that scientists have been able to show that the same area of the brain is activated for both visual and auditory beauty in the same subjects. This implies that beauty does, indeed, exist as an abstract concept within the brain.

The medial orbito-frontal cortex was not the only region to be activated by beauty. As might be expected, the visual cortex, which responds to visual stimuli, was more active when viewing a painting than when listening to music, and vice versa for the auditory cortex.

However, particularly interesting was that activity in another region, the caudate nucleus, found near the centre of the brain, increased in proportion to the relative visual beauty of a painting. The caudate nucleus has been reported previously to correlate with romantic love, suggesting a neural correlate for the relationship between beauty and love
.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/07/110706195800.htm

Scientists find mechanism that causes noise-induced tinnitus and drug that can prevent it

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Thu, 30 May 2013 14:47:24 PDT

Teufelskreise beim Tinnitus-Syndrom (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

An epilepsy drug shows promise in an animal model at preventing tinnitus from developing after exposure to loud noise, according to a new study by researchers at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. The findings, reported this week in the early online version of theProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, reveal for the first time the reason the chronic and sometimes debilitating condition occurs.An estimated 5 to 15 percent of Americans hear whistling, clicking, roaring and other phantom sounds of tinnitus, which typically is induced by exposure to very loud noise, said senior investigator Thanos Tzounopoulos, Ph.D., associate professor and member of the auditory research group in the Department of Otolaryngology, Pitt School of Medicine.

"There is no cure for it, and current therapies such as hearing aids don't provide relief for many patients," he said. "We hope that by identifying the underlying cause, we can develop effective interventions."

The team focused on an area of the brain that is home to an important auditory center called the dorsal cochlear nucleus (DCN). From previous research in a mouse model, they knew that tinnitus is associated with hyperactivity of DCN cells -- they fire impulses even when there is no actual sound to perceive. For the new experiments, they took a close look at the biophysical properties of tiny channels, called KCNQ channels, through which potassium ions travel in and out of the cell.

"We found that mice with tinnitus have hyperactive DCN cells because of a reduction in KCNQ potassium channel activity," Dr. Tzounopoulos said. "These KCNQ channels act as effective "brakes" that reduce excitability or activity of neuronal cells."
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/05/130527153701.htm

Cogmed Update of Day 10

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Mon, 27 May 2013 20:05:44 PDT

Talked to Cogmed Coach on Friday. Not to worry about progress on memory. People often dont show progress on day 10. It takes a little longer for things to kick in.
Copyright © 2010-2013 Traveller Journey Through The Cortex

Small Breakthrough with Music Therapy

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Sat, 25 May 2013 02:00:03 PDT

The modern keyboard is based on the intervallic patterns of the diatonic scale. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The other day, my music therapist asked me to sit down at the piano and play with her. I am very much a beginner piano player so I have always been very hesitant. When I have played the piano in the past, I always stuck to playing with one hand because it has been to much for me to think about improvising and coordinate both hands. A lot of times my playing has tended to be a bit rote and mechanical as well.

But this time, I said that I was going to be a bit adventuresome and I sat down and played with two hands using the pentatonic scale (just the black keys). I was also a lot more expressive and fluid.

Copyright © 2010-2013 Traveller Journey Through The Cortex

Cogmed: Day 10

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Fri, 24 May 2013 10:46:06 PDT

English: Baddeley's model of working memory in English (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Just finished day 10 of Cogmed and am a bit disappointed.

I have been doing a series of exercises that target various aspects of working and short term memory. Some of the exercises that rely on auditory memory, I am doing reasonably well with. Assembly, which has you listen to letters and then click on them in order was a no brainer. Did really well with it and after 3 trials at level 8, Cogmed stopped that exercise.

Memory exercises like remembering numbers and then clicking them on in reverse order have been more challenging but have been making some progress. So that's nice.

But exercises that work on visual spatial system have been a bear. I have been getting some small hard won progress on some exercises that simply have you remember things in sequence. But I have been getting nowhere on exercises that show items and then change orientation by 90 degrees or have you track rotating items.

Had my almost midterm assessment. I didn't sleep well last night so maybe that has something to do with it. Or maybe not. Good news is that my ability to follow instructions has gone up to a low average. Bad news is getting nowhere on working memory. Doing simple math is OK, I am only missing two items on the test. Don't know if that is significant or not.

Just wish I was doing better on visual spatial. One thing I am noticing is that I am doing better with items that are near each other than with figuring out where items are that are across the grid. I am wondering how much of this is due to my visual midline shift problems or eye tracking problems. With visual midline shifts you don't know where things are in relationship to your body. With eye tracking, your eyes are bouncing around a bit when trying to focus on things.

Or, am I just stuck. I've done as much as I can do and that's that.

So, this is the question that has bedeviled me since the beginning of the Journey Through The Cortex. How much is a sensory issue and how much are global issues?
Copyright © 2010-2013 Traveller Journey Through The Cortex

Auditory processing disorder (APD): Schisms and skirmishes

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Wed, 22 May 2013 02:00:05 PDT

Spanish version of a schematic representation of auditory signaling. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Survey of the controversies within Auditory Processing disorder, especially when using a SCAN-C, a common diagnostic test, with children who do not speak English well.

In 2006, David
Moore, Director of the Medical Research Council’s Institute of Hearing Research
in Nottingham, created a stir when he published a paper arguing that APD
diagnosis should be based on performance on non-linguistic tests of auditory
perception. Moore’s concern was that tests such as SCAN-C, which use speech
stimuli, can’t distinguish an auditory problem from a language problem. I made
similar arguments in a blog post written last year. Consider the task of doing a speech perception test in a
foreign language: if you don’t know the language very well, then you may fail
the test because you are poor at distinguishing unfamiliar speech sounds or
recognising specific words. This wouldn’t mean you had an auditory disorder.

A recent paper by
Loo et al (2012) provided concrete evidence for this concern. They compared
multilingual and monolingual children on performance on an APD battery. All
children were schooled in English, but a high proportion spoke another language
at home. The child’s language background
did not affect performance on non-linguistic APD tests, but had a significant
effect on most of the speech-based tests.

In 2006, David
Moore, Director of the Medical Research Council’s Institute of Hearing Research
in Nottingham, created a stir when he published a paper arguing that APD
diagnosis should be based on performance on non-linguistic tests of auditory
perception. Moore’s concern was that tests such as SCAN-C, which use speech
stimuli, can’t distinguish an auditory problem from a language problem. I made
similar arguments in a blog post written last year. Consider the task of doing a speech perception test in a
foreign language: if you don’t know the language very well, then you may fail
the test because you are poor at distinguishing unfamiliar speech sounds or
recognising specific words. This wouldn’t mean you had an auditory disorder.

Dillon and
Cameron (Australia) queried the usefulness of a general term such as APD, when
the reality was that there may be many different types of auditory difficulty,
each requiring its own specific test. They described their own work on ‘spatial
listening disorder’, arguing that this did relate to clinical presentation.

The most critical
of Moore et al’s arguments were Bellis and colleagues (USA). They implied that
a good clinician can get around the confound between language and auditory
assessments: “Additional controls in cases in which the possible presence of a
linguistic or memory confound exists may include assessing performance in the
non-manipulated condition (e.g. monaural versus dichotic, nonfiltered versus
filtered, etc.) to ensure that performance deficits seen on CAPD tests are due
to the acoustic manipulations rather than to lack of familiarity with the
language and/or significantly reduced memory skills.” Furthermore, according to
Bellis et al, the fact that speech tasks don’t correlate with non-speech tasks
is all the more reason for using speech tasks in an assessment, because “in
some cases central auditory processing deficits may only be revealed using
speech tasks”.

http://albertochil.blogspot.com/2012/10/auditory-processing-disorder-apd.html

The brain is the body

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Sun, 19 May 2013 02:00:04 PDT

I am working on working memory and doing Cogmed so I thought I would augment it a bit by looking into memorizing some choreography. The folks at A Total Approach had great success when they integrated more than one modality so I am thinking about rolling my own little motor memory routine.

Emily S. Cross, a dancer turned neuroscientist at the Max Planck Institute for Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Leipzig, Germany, so marveled at the complexity required to learn Laura Dean’s Skylight, a piece that her dance ensemble was rehearsing, that she began to devise a neuroimaging experiment to investigate the ways the brain and body interact to learn movement. She has since created a landmark study on dancers’ brains. Cross takes the mirror neuron theory into the realm of dance and visual learning. She discovered that learning steps can be accelerated whenever dancers watch a movement sequence they have performed before. Observation of the same movement patterns deepens the neural grooves placed there by actually performing the steps.

Cross’ work has established the neurological roots of movement visualization principles. She uses functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to map areas of the brain that are engaged when dancers observe movement. “My work supports the common intuition that a combination of observation and physical rehearsal is the best way to learn new work,” says Cross. “Performing along with an expert demonstrator standing in front of the learner, facing away from the learner so that the right arm is mapped on to the right arm and so on, is ideal.”

Reck, who has studied Cross’ work, asks her dancers to watch others perform movement as a rehearsal strategy. She also conducts a “neural rehearsal,” which requires precise movement and visualization with each step. Her dancers must see the movement in their minds as they do it. “Neural rehearsals are great for getting a sequence into place,” notes Cross, “while full energy rehearsals are required to build the patterning that will be required to perform the piece.”

So maybe a watch and do and then neural rehearsal.

http://www.dancemagazine.com/issues/July-2010/Your-Body-Memory-Builders

Local and Global Auditory Processing: Behavioral and ERP Evidence

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Sat, 18 May 2013 02:00:03 PDT

Since my vision is improving and I am able to do more with two eyes, I am noticing that I am doing more global processing. I was wondering about improving my global processing with my auditory system as well and I came across this interesting article that suggests that timing is a key component of global auditory processing.

The study described here suggests that temporal aspects of auditory stimuli better capture the local-global distinction. By combining short (40 ms) frequency modulated tones in series to create global auditory patterns (500 ms), we independently varied whether pitch increased or decreased over short time spans (local) and longer time spans (global). Accuracy and reaction time measures revealed better performance for global judgments and asymmetric interference that were modulated by amount of pitch change.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1850243/

Executive Function Skills

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Fri, 17 May 2013 19:38:00 PDT

Really Good presentation on Executive Function Skills. Incorporates people skills along with executive function.

STOP: Space, Time, Objects, People.

Space: Read the Room. What's Going On?

Time: Be on the TimeLine, Have a sense of Pace and Time Passing
What is coming Up?

Object: Read the Object

People: Read People, Face, Body, Appearance, Mood, Pace, Saying

Then Discusses the STOP Paradigm in terms of 3 Levels of Executive Functioning:

Self Regulation
Organization and Integration of Information
Higher Order Reasoning Skills

For Self Regulation:

Picture the Space You are in or are Going to be In

What does the outcome look like?

What plan will you need to make it look like this?

T: Account for Time

When will this happen or does it need to be completed by •What are the time expectations

How much time is involved

Will the pace of time feel fast or slow

Sequence

The information, The materials , The plan

O: Determine what objects are necessary to complete the task

Find materials

Purchase materials

Make do with what you have

P: What people do you need or can you expect to interact with?

Also, think about capacity for Attention.

http://westborough.ma.schoolwebpages.com/education/page/download.php?fileinfo=ZWZfbGVjdHVyZXdlc3Rib3JvdWdoaGFuZG91dHMucGRmOjo6L3d3dzcvc2Nob29scy9tYS93ZXN0Ym9yb3VnaC9pbWFnZXMvZG9jbWdyLzEyOTVmaWxlODMyMy5wZGY=§iondetailid=5936

I really like the presentation because it gives me a framework to look at some of my higher order deficits:

Space: It can be hard for me to read the room when my eyes aren't focusing and I don't have depth perception, yet. These skills are getting better day by day but they aren't there yet.
Time: Still a bit of a problem making and being on the time line. Getting better at being on time but still not there yet. I think getting my sleep sorted out is helping as my body just doesn't get as tired out and can maintain the pace.
Object: Read the Object. Ditto on vision skills. Also, occular motor integration is getting important. So I can manipulate the object.
People. Ditto on Vision skills. Need to work on Auditory. Also audio visual integration is really important here.

CogMed and Memory Training

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Fri, 17 May 2013 09:58:38 PDT

English: Baddeley's model of working memory in English (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

My memory needs work!

Just started doing Cogmed, a brain training program that targets working memory. Working memory is a system for both temporary storage and manipulation of information. I am pretty forgetful at times but I had put off worrying about it until I got a certain amount of my sensory problems sorted out. I figured my brain was having enough to do just processing my distorted senses without worrying about storage.

However, I have actually been working on working memory at times while doing my vision and auditory therapy as they have all had memory exercises targeted towards memory included as part of the therapy. So, I have done some work on this already. But, now is the time to look at working memory itself.

Cogmed is pretty intense: 5 days a week for 5 weeks. Oif. And it is tiring. I play a series of games on the computer.

I do well on the Assembly test where you listen to a sequence of letters, and then choose the correct letter out of a short list of leters. I am scoring about a 4-5 on most of the other tests except those involving moving parts. Those I do terribly on.

Cogmed has recently become a bit controversial. There are a number of articles attacking brain fitness games and, in particular, Cogmed. I am going to attach some of the criticism below and let greater minds than mine figure this out.

Copyright © 2010-2013 Traveller Journey Through The Cortex

Vision Therapy Update May 14

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Fri, 17 May 2013 13:03:11 PDT

HVS (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Vision Therapy is chugging on slowly.

Just had an assessment from the doctor and my vision is improving slowly. I am not skipping around as I read as much -- at least from the point of view of looking at how my eyes track on a page. However, I am skipping lines. I read 400 wpm but had a 70% comprehension rate. Unlike the time before when I read 320 wpm but had a 90% comprehension rate.

Unfortunately, it seems that my convergence and divergence is slipping so I got some exercises to work on for that.

Copyright © 2010-2013 Traveller Journey Through The Cortex

Apd and audiologists

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Wed, 15 May 2013 02:00:07 PDT

Hearing exam (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

On picking an audiologist for APD

First, nearly all audiologists have their own test batteries from which they
select APD tests. There are guidelines as to which APD domains should be
included but not all children, nor adults for that matter, may be good
candidates for all tests.

Secondly, there are different approaches to intepretation. For instance, many
of us adhere to the model of interpretation suggested by Frank Musiek, Ph.D.,
one of the leading, if not THE leading audiologist who has done research and
developed APD tests. Dr. Musiek recommends an intepretation of individual
tests and their impact on the individual, which is the method used by a large
majority of audiologists. This model requires that one knows the neuroanatomical and
physiological correlates that are involved in the task being tested. There is
a quite different approach taken by Bellis and Ferre, which presumes that a
cluster of APD abnormalities represents a broader interpretation of deficits;
then there is the unique approach of Dr. Lucker, etc.

Third, it is important to determine if the audiologist has expertise in
working with pediatrics, in the cases where younger children might be evaluated. A
"pediatric" audiologist is one who has much experince working with a diverse
pediatric population so that children who are more challenging, may actually
be able to undergo APD testing. Many of us with such experience are very
comfortable using the APD tests with normative data for very young children,
in testing them.

Fourth, it is very helpful if the audiologist provides educational
recommendations and is familiar with supports available in an educational
setting. Audiologists who have spen time in schools and/or who have an
educational audiology background usually are more aware of the academic side
of APD. For those of us who have spent time in schools, knowing how the system
works, how IEPs are developed, and what it take to classify children, can be
extremely helpful. Many of us, myself included, work with advocates who help
implement our recommendations.

Overall, there may be different approaches to doing APD assessment. Recently,
the American Academy of Audiology (AAA) CAPD Task Force, of which I was a
member, developed CAPD Guidelines for audiologists. This document is on the
AAA web site and was meant to provide guidelines in the hopes that there would be
a more unified approach to doing APD work with children and adults. Our doctoral
education programs are now trying to include APD coursework to further this
unification. Salus University, formerly PA College of Optometry, has an
intense course (which I teach) as part of the AuD program.

What we audiologists need to be careful about is recognizing that there are
differences in the approach to identification of APD. Granted, some
audiologists are more experienced than others, but there is no "gold standard"
so we need to be careful about stating that some "correctly" do or do not
evaluate APD. Such differences also exist in the medical field in which one
oncologist treats patients one way and another may treat that same patient
with a different approach.

I will say that there is an effort to have audiologists who specialize in APD,
I'd suggest that when seeking an audiologist for an APD evaluation, that
several
questions be asked of the audiologist to help determine whether or not you
want
to have them work with your child.

First, nearly all audiologists have their own test batteries from which they
select APD tests. There are guidelines as to which APD domains should be
included but not all children, nor adults for that matter, may be good
candidates for all tests.

Secondly, there are different approaches to intepretation. For instance, many
of us adhere to the model of interpretation suggested by Frank Musiek, Ph.D.,
one of the leading, if not THE leading audiologist who has done research and
developed APD tests. Dr. Musiek recommends an intepretation of individual
tests
and their impact on the individual, which is the method used by a large
majority
of audiologists. This model requires that one knows the neuroanatomical and
physiological correlates that are involved in the task being tested. There is
a quite different approach taken by Bellis and Ferre, which presumes that a
cluster of APD abnormalities represents a broader interpretation of deficits;
then there is the unique approach of Dr. Lucker, etc.

Third, it is important to determine if the audiologist has expertise in
working with pediatrics, in the cases where younger children might be evaluated. A
"pediatric" audiologist is one who has much experince working with a diverse
pediatric population so that children who are more challenging, may actually
be able to undergo APD testing. Many of us with such experience are very
comfortable using the APD tests with normative data for very young children,
in testing them.

Fourth, it is very helpful if the audiologist provides educational
recommendations and is familiar with supports available in an educational
setting. Audiologists who have spen time in schools and/or who have an
educational audiology background usually are more aware of the academic side
of APD. For those of us who have spent time in schools, knowing how the system
works, how IEPs are developed, and what it take to classify children, can be
extremely helpful. Many of us, myself included, work with advocates who help
implement our recommendations.

Overall, there may be different approaches to doing APD assessment. Recently,
the American Academy of Audiology (AAA) CAPD Task Force, of which I was a
member, developed CAPD Guidelines for audiologists. This document is on the
AAA
web site and was meant to provide guidelines in the hopes that there would be
a
more unified approach to doing APD work with children and adults. Our doctoral
education programs are now trying to include APD coursework to further this
unification. Salus University, formerly PA College of Optometry, has an
intense
course (which I teach) as part of the AuD program.

What we audiologists need to be careful about is recognizing that there are
differences in the approach to identification of APD. Granted, some
audiologists are more experienced than others, but there is no "gold standard"
so we need to be careful about stating that some "correctly" do or do not
evaluate APD. Such differences also exist in the medical field in which one
oncologist treats patients one way and another may treat that same patient
with
a different approach.

I will say that there is an effort to have audiologists who specialize in APD,
joining together for the purpose of advancing our knowledge and research
interests, but also to help others know how to find us. It is Frank Musiek who
is spearheading this effort, a work in progress.

Training the Musical Brain: Explicit and Implicit Memory in Learning Music

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Tue, 14 May 2013 19:21:36 PDT

topography of brain cortex (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Found a great blog on music and neuroscience. The blog talks about memory, attention, and music practice. It is written by an adjunct professor in neuroscience who also happens to be a musician.

Here's some tips on memorizing pieces. The trick is to tie in some analysis of the piece being played along with practice and repetition. She has a lot of good things to say about motor memory.

When we perform music, we need to use both implicit memory and explicit memory. Many pianists have had the experience of playing the piano using implicit memory only; it seems like the hands can play the piece without any input from the brain! That’s actually not true: unconscious parts of the brain like the cerebellum and basal ganglia are telling the motor cortex what commands to send to the muscles, but it feels like the brain is not involved because these are unconscious processes. The downside of this automatic type of playing is that often pianists find that if they start thinking about what they’re playing, they make a mistake and are unable to continue playing the song. What’s happening here is that the conscious parts of our brain are sending commands to the motor cortex that interfere with the commands coming from the cerebellum, and so we get mixed up. The solution to this problem is that we should not let the performance of a piece get too automatic. How can we accomplish this? The best way is to form explicit memories of the piece alongside the implicit memories. For instance, you could analyze the chord structure of the piece and memorize that, so you would know what chord you should be playing at each moment. Or you could form an explicit memory of what notes you should be playing at the beginning of every fourth bar (or each phrase). Or whatever works for you. The key thing is to at least have some explicit memory of the song, even if it is just every few bars, that way if you lose your automatic train of thought, you have an explicit landmark to go back to, so you can get back into the song and continue playing.

This was my first main point of the talk: When learning music, it is important to form explicit memories along with implicit memories.

http://trainingthemusicalbrain.blogspot.com/2011/10/explicit-and-implicit-memory-in.html

Zigging and Zagging and Bilateral Motor Planning

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 02:00:05 PDT

As my Gentle Readers remember, I have been doing all kinds of exercises to improve bilateral function these days. So, I decided to take it out to the real world and try a little dance classes at my local gym. So I walked in on a Zumba class and began shaking my booty.

Well the class zigged and I zagged. Think I have a bit more work on my bilateral exercises.

Posted with Blogsy

More on music therapy

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 02:00:09 PDT

I have been playing along in music therapy on some different instruments. I have not always been sure about the point but somehow I think it has been helping.

It is a very non directive therapy. The therapist and I play together and we see where we are going. One problem is that I am not very fluent in music and am definitely non good at improvising on the fly. (remember my problems with adaptative processing?). Bilateral skills are also challenging.

So, I stay away from the piano. I Am a beginner at it. And we never get anywhere as I can't organize my hands fast enough. So we stick xylophone, drums, and some very pretty textural instruments like rain sticks, etc.

Lately, we have taken up some of my bilateral exercises such as slap and tap and are doing them to music. This is going nicely. There is something about rhythmically moving to music and humming that helps the process.

Posted with Blogsy

Interesting post on language and vision

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Fri, 24 May 2013 10:48:56 PDT

Thanks Suzanna for your question. Firstly you ask: "Do any of your patients experience linguistic confusion?"

The answer is definitely YES. In 1976, while studying Speech Pathology and Audiology for my Master's degree work, I published a paper on visual and auditory processing. As we well know there are visual connections in the brain that are linked from auditory parts. What this means is that our hearing and listening is affected as we re-educate the visual processing system. In my own case, at the age of 39, I could understand words from a song on the radio, while driving, for the first time. In addition, I have always had a kind of dyslexic approach to languages and great fear. This is changing now. In my case, it took a while before I had the confidence to verbalise, say words in German, for example. It appears that the binocular vision process activates new and deeper pathways that disorganises habitual language patterns. Fortunately, this is short-lived in my patients.

Sovoto.com

Posted with Blogsy

Openfocus

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 02:00:02 PDT

Went and had an evaluation over at Princeton Biofeedback Center for some neurofeedback. After getting myself really scrambled up and losing track of time and space, my Gentle Readers may wonder why I am trying this stuff again, albeit with a different provider. However, somehow, I do think this is the right thing to do and I would like to try to do this with a different provider.

I think these folks are the right ones for me. Instead of looking at my neurology reports, they looked at my symptoms. In particular, they were interested in physical and psychological problems. I am wondering if I have a very low level but constant agitated depression/anxiety/ADHD cluster. Rather than pointing out a single diagnosis at this point, I am wondering if somehow this whole clump of inattentiveness and irritability is somehow related. Maybe my problems are a big stress response sort of thing.

My first session went pretty well. It was much different from the other provider. The other folks used a bipolar protocol with electrodes at c5 and C3 on my head as well as an electrode on my ear. I watched a game of PacMan (chomper). This time, my therapist put a band around my head and inserted some electrodes around my head. I closed my eyes and was told that when I was in sync with my alpha waves, the light woud start flashing and a buzzer would start beeping. I listened to a CD on visualizing space within my body.

I felt remarkably calm after it was over. My binocular vision improved. Went home and felt very calm but a bit tired. Some mild tinnitus. I had this sense that one of my fears about returning to work in this very lousy economy had dissipated. I just got this very deep sense that it would all work out. Maybe everyone who is unemployed these days should get neurofeedback as part of their unemployment benefits!

Posted with Blogsy

Vision Therapy, Slap and Tap

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 12:25:47 PDT

Vision therapy Is going on with a new focus. In addition to the work we have been doing on the visual midline shift, my therapist and I figured out that I haven't done all the preparatory exercises that she thought my other vision therapists would have done. Perils of moving on to new therapists, I guess.

I don't have as good a grounding with bilateral exercises as she had thought. So I got a bunch of exercises to work on such as Slap and Tap where I slap different sides of my body or tap my left and right to the beat of a metronome. Or I look at arrows pointed in different directions and point accordingly. The. There is the circles and triangles on different sides of a line. I have a "circle" hand and a "triangle" hand and I move them across my midline accordingly.

We are also using the prisms more. I have a base in 30 for my left eye and a base in 8 for my right eye. Odd combination. But remember I have a visual midline shift. I am on a balance board and am gripping it with my toes mightily as the prisms are changed.

We are doing a lot of multisensory work. So it's a lot of calling out and walking around with prisms as well.

I am definitely getting there though. Much better sense of space.

Posted with Blogsy

Nintendo Wii 'should be used to train surgeons' - Telegraph

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Sun, 21 Apr 2013 16:56:00 PDT

Nintendo Wii 'should be used to train surgeons' - Telegraph: A group of postgraduate surgeons at the University of Rome were put on a month-long programme of gaming using the Nintendo’s Wii console.
Researchers then compared their performance with doctors who had not spent an hour a day playing games.
Those that had been playing with the Wii scored significantly higher as a group in simulated tasks designed to test the skills needed for laparascopy, or keyhole surgery.
The authors of the report, writing in the scientific journal PLOS One, said that using the Wii could become a “helpful, inexpensive and entertaining part of the training of young laparoscopists in addition to a standard surgical education based on simulators and the operating room.”

Copyright © 2010-2013 Traveller Journey Through The Cortex

Opticians don't know how to measure PD for strabismics -

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Sun, 21 Apr 2013 13:04:25 PDT

IMPORTANT: Opticians don't know how to measure PD for strabismics - Sovoto

I am going to cross post this message as it is extremely important for strabismics and for parents of strabismic children seeking prism lenses.

Be extra careful when ordering prism glasses as some opticians have no idea what to do with strabismic patients and may calculate their own pupillary distance (PD) measurement that will not be the same as the developmental optometrist's PD. The difference in the PD measurement can have disastrous effects on your prescription. Although Luxottica Retail says they'll change their training programs for their opticians after my incident, I don't know if they really will. Even if you go to non-Luxottica owned optical stores, make sure the optician doesn't override your doctor's prescription because of the "Standard Operating Procedure" for measuring PD.
I am not exaggerating when I say that what I experienced could have been fatal. Below is the description of what happened to me.

After two and a half LONG years in VT, I finally got a prescription for prism glasses in mid May. I went to Sears Optical to fill the prescription and after a long delay in making my lenses, I received a pair that almost caused me to crash my car because the pupillary distance was incorrectly calculated by the optician.

Effect: I had to drive with one eye closed because my left field of vision moved faster than my right field. The divider lanes on the left doubled at a 20 degree angle into my lane, causing me to get confused as to where my lane was. At night, the extra divider lane was not only at a 20 degree angle but it was sometimes elevated above ground. If you've ever had to drive with an eye closed, you know how hard it is.
I couldn't look down when descending a staircase because the end of the step would also double at a 20 degree angle, making it hard for me to see where the end of each step was. Other lines, whether they be on sidewalks or my kitchen floor, would double or be distorted.

This is especially important in Pennsylvania where the counter people do not have to be licensed opticians. For strabismics, you can get yourself really hurt. For normal folks, you can go round and round trying to get your glasses straightened out especially if you use the chains like Sears or Pearl Vision. In New Jersey, however, you MUST be a licensed optician to sell eye glasses

Posted with Blogsy

Update on Vision Therapy: We are cracking the code

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Sun, 21 Apr 2013 16:53:33 PDT

I think we are starting to nail it and I am on track to getting my Stereo Sue moment where I have true depth perception. As my Gentle Readers recall, I do have good binocular vision with 20 degrees of stereopsis. However, I do have a Visual Midline Shift.

So, we have been doing work with yoked prisms. First, vertical and, now horizontal.

Also, we have been doing a lot of multisensory work with walking heel and toe while reading down and across a column of letters.

Other drills include vision HTS on a big touch screen where I working my peripheral vision as I touch letters of the alphabet or chase after moving red, white and blue dots.

We are also putting a piece of paper at my sternum and I am tracking a ball in space. This forces me to use my left eye more which had got shut down.

Lot of work on balance board.

Net effect. I can see a much bigger area. When I drive, I am aware of what is going on on the other side of a muti lane highway. My panoramas and vistas are much broader. For example, I can take in many of the buildings of Philadelphia airport along with the runways and the planes sitting on them. When I drive north from Delaware, I can see the full complex of the Boeing defense plant. As I approach Philadelphia, I see the vast industrial works of South Philadelphia--its refinery storage, warehouses, and then the skyscrapers that make up the background.

Posted with Blogsy

Rubin museum brainwave talk

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Fri, 19 Apr 2013 02:00:01 PDT

Went to the Rubin as part of their brainwave series. This year, they are focussing on illusion. Next year at the Rubin Museum will be a series on Tibetan Medicine. I've been getting very interested at the intersection of Tibetan meditation, medicine, and neuroscience. More on that later.

As part of brainwave exhibit, Lior Lev Sercarz looks at your past and present through spices.

Donald Wilson is a neuroscientist who looks at memory, learning and smell.

Sercarz notes that you can't turn off smell . Wilson replies that this is part of autonomic system. Two things you can do to enhance smell: 1. Is to inhale. Sniff. The turbulence and flow of air influences how the molecules of smell reach your nose, 2. Humans are better at than any other animal with retro nasal smell associated with flavor and taste.

Wilson says that sense of smell is very fast because olfactory brain has a much shorter pathway. Smell in lizard is very similar to that of humans. We have added on speech pathways. 300 ms to figure out what it is. ms to decide whether to eat

Interesting talk. Got to sample spices. Maybe I will have Sercarz make a bespoke spice mix for me. Anybody got any good ideas? I wonder I'd he has anything for memory, cognitive processing speed, and smell

Posted with Blogsy

Update on Hubby's Therapy

noreply@blogger.com (Traveller) — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 18:48:35 PDT

Hubby has been doing some Tomatis and Interactive Metronome therapy with the peeps over at A Total Approach. He has been moving much faster through the therapies than I had which does make me a bit jealous. Also, he hasn't been getting as wiped out by them as I did.

His therapy is a bit different. Hubby gets a massage and then He has to do some physical exercises to strengthen his core muscles. Poor hubby, he really doesn't have much in terms of core muscles. Unlike the rest of the male half of the human race, Hubby has a very thin muscle wall around his abdomen. So, no matter how hard he tries, Hubby will never have six pack abs.

He, then spends his time with the Interactive Metronome. So far, hubby doesn't have much to report except he is starting to get a little tired from IM.

Hubby has seen anything notable happening this week. Be we are expecting an improvement in coordination in the weeks to come.

Posted with Blogsy

Journey through the Cortex

New Training Program for Auditory Processing Disorder

Related articles

Misaligned Teeth, Bad Posture and Eye Problems

Beauty is in the medial orbito-frontal cortex of the beholder

Related articles

Scientists find mechanism that causes noise-induced tinnitus and drug that can prevent it

Cogmed Update of Day 10

Related articles

Small Breakthrough with Music Therapy

Cogmed: Day 10

Related articles

Auditory processing disorder (APD): Schisms and skirmishes

Related articles

The brain is the body

Related articles

Local and Global Auditory Processing: Behavioral and ERP Evidence

Related articles

Executive Function Skills

STOP: Space, Time, Objects, People.

Then Discusses the STOP Paradigm in terms of 3 Levels of Executive Functioning:

Picture the Space You are in or are Going to be In

What does the outcome look like? What plan will you need to make it look like this?

T: Account for Time When will this happen or does it need to be completed by •What are the time expectations How much time is involved Will the pace of time feel fast or slow Sequence The information, The materials , The plan O: Determine what objects are necessary to complete the task

Find materials Purchase materials Make do with what you have P: What people do you need or can you expect to interact with?

Related articles

CogMed and Memory Training

Related articles

Vision Therapy Update May 14

Related articles

Apd and audiologists

Related articles

Training the Musical Brain: Explicit and Implicit Memory in Learning Music

Related articles

Zigging and Zagging and Bilateral Motor Planning

More on music therapy

Interesting post on language and vision

Openfocus

Vision Therapy, Slap and Tap

Nintendo Wii 'should be used to train surgeons' - Telegraph

Related articles

Opticians don't know how to measure PD for strabismics -

Update on Vision Therapy: We are cracking the code

Related articles

Rubin museum brainwave talk

Update on Hubby's Therapy

What does the outcome look like?

What plan will you need to make it look like this?

T: Account for Time

When will this happen or does it need to be completed by •What are the time expectations

How much time is involved

Will the pace of time feel fast or slow

Sequence

The information, The materials , The plan

O: Determine what objects are necessary to complete the task

Find materials

Purchase materials

Make do with what you have

P: What people do you need or can you expect to interact with?