Sensing Using Physical and Psychological Observations for Rehabilitating Troops (SUPPORT)

The injuries of today's returning soldiers are dramatically different than those of previous deployments and necessitate unique forms of support. There have been increased incidences of Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), and early intervention can reduce the severity of the disease and the cost of treatment, but we lack the human and technology resources for early diagnosis. This project builds upon assistive technologies for independent living by using a holistic approach that addresses both physical and emotional needs. We propose to create comprehensive designs for the underlying architecture and some key components of SUPPORT, a tool for recovering troops and caregivers to monitor health and well being, be alerted of potential problems, and manage treatment regimes. SUPPORT will use contextual cross referencing of physiological and psychological measures to accurately assess patient conditions. We will use advanced user interface design techniques that leverage human interaction theory combined with a cognitive orthotic system that utilizes sophisticated scheduling and planning algorithms to produce a non-intrusive yet highly interactive solution that encourages prolonged user engagement and human-machine collaboration for long term self-care, provides tools for patient-caregiver communication, and facilitates preventative care by early diagnosis of disease symptoms.