Artificial intelligence stains signs of hidden awareness in coma patients before doctors do

Artificial intelligence stains signs of hidden awareness in coma patients before doctors do

Written by Andrew Chapman Earned by Alison Parchal

Imagine lying in the hospital bed, awake but unable to move your body to communicate with the people around you. The “secret awareness” experience is a fact for many people who have been injured in the brain. In a new study published in Telecom medicineThe researchers found They can discover signs of awareness in coma patients Using artificial intelligence to analyze the face movements that were very small so that doctors do not notice it.

It was a good awareness Discover for the first time in 2006When the researchers asked for a woman who does not respond and healthy volunteers imagined to carry out specific tasks while they are in the brain scanner. The team found that the woman showed brain activity in the same areas as volunteers. Only last year, researchers who used methods of brain photography found that one in four patients did not respond in secret behavior. Such tests are not carried out routinely on people in the event that they do not respond because this type of nervous imaging takes a long time and requires specialized skills. Instead, doctors usually rely on more self -visual examinations to measure a person’s awareness level, test whether they open their eyes, respond to orders or amazing in high noise.

“We were trying to find a way to measure the awareness of these patients” using simple and easily available technology, “says Sima Mofakham, the arithmetic nerve scientist at Stony Brook University and the new study author.

To support the scientific press

If you enjoy this article, think about supporting the award -winning press Subscribe. By buying a subscription, it helps ensure the future of influencing stories about the discoveries and ideas that make up our world today.

Mofakham and her team recorded 37 patients with recent brain injuries and who seemed to be in a coma. They followed the facial movements of the participants with unusual details – at the level of individual pores – after they were given orders such as “Open your eyes” or “get rid of your tongue”. Discover AI’s tracking tool for researchers, which they call seem, that is, facial movements and then analyze whether the movements are for the matter. Documentary responses that open the eye in 30 of 36 patients and mouth movements in 16 out of 17 patients with analysis videos. Five of these patients did not continue to produce greater signs of movement that were visible to doctors, although most others did it. On average, Semente discovered the participants trying to open their eyes and transport their mouths respectively 4.1 and 8.3 days before doctors discovered these signs.

“What we found is: Patients develop [small] “The movements before going to movements are more clear,” says Mocham.

Jean -Kalasen, a neurologist at the University of Colombia, who did not participate in the new research, says this ability to discover awareness earlier is clinically. Signs of consciousness can provide another layer of information for doctors and family members who choose between a set of treatments, from picnic care to the most aggressive treatments. “Every day it is likely to be important,” Clasen says. Disclosure can also be allowed earlier to the care teams to start the rehabilitation programs used to improve the motor skills of patients sooner. Separate research shows this Rehabilitation start earlier It is associated with greater improvements in the physical function.

Consciousness is often after a brain injury and unpredictable. “When someone recovers consciousness, it is almost similar to the light bulb,” says Klasen. “This does not only come or outside.” The new study followed the participants only until six months after they were discharged from the hospital. But it is possible that some patients whose conditions have been more stable and currently assume unconscious in long -term care facilities may also show signs of awareness that can be discovered, both with the most advanced nervous imaging techniques or the simplified mixture technology. “We have to do experiences and see,” said Movakham. “There is an opportunity.”

Next, Mofakham plans to study if patients can answer yes questions or not by using specific facial movements. “This has great moral effects” because people who cannot communicate “cannot participate in their care.” “This study opens a way to communicate with these patients.”

It is time to defend science

If you enjoy this article, I would like to ask for your support. American scientific She worked as a defender of science and industry for 180 years, and it may now be the most important moments in the history of this century.

You were American scientific The subscriber since I was 12 years old, and he helped form the way I look at the world. Let me know He always teaches me and makes me happy, and inspires a feeling of awe for our beautiful and beautiful world. I hope it is also for you.

If you Subscribe to American scientificYou are helping to ensure that our coverage focuses on research and detection of important; We have the necessary resources to report decisions that threaten laboratories throughout the United States; We support both emerging scholars and workers at a time when the value of the science itself does not recognize.

On the other hand, you get basic news, Charity podcasts, wonderful graphs, You cannot miss newsletters, videos must be watched, Difficult games, the best writing and preparation in the world of science. You can even A person’s gift subscription.

There was no more important time for us to stand and show the reason for the importance of science. I hope you support us in that task.