DANA; A Tool to Detect Cognitive Changes in Pre-clinical and MCI Patients

Project Summary Abstract The goal of this proposed two phase project is to develop the Digital Automated Neurobehavioral AssessmentDANAapp into a tool that can be easily used by patients with Mild Cognitive ImpairmentMCIand Alzheimer s diseaseADand can provide clinicians with meaningful data in the tracking and diagnosis of these conditionsDANA is an FDA cleared neurocognitive assessment tool that has been previously used with similar populations and has been shown to be a valid and reliable method for screening cognitive functioning and tracking changes in cognitive functioning over timeThe specific aims of the proposal arein Phase IDetermine technical feasibility and diagnostic accuracy of high frequency cognitive testing with DANAin Phase IITechnical development of DANA for in home useandEstablish predictive validity of DANA for the early detection of Alzheimer s diseaseIn Phase Ithis project will implement a pilot studyMCI patients and normal controls will take DANA both in clinic and at home in order to examine the feasibility of this population using DANA in the home and DANA s ability to discriminate between healthy and impaired usersIn Phase IIthis project will build on the results of Phase I to technically refine the DANA tool to better fit the needs of MCI patientsThe refined app will be deployed in an experimentinvolving MCI patients and normal controlsthat will establish the predictive validity of DANA for the early detection of Alzheimer s disease Project Narrative Tracking the progression of Alzheimer s disease is central to planning and implementing care for sufferers of the diseaseand current methods fall short in providing the quality and depth of data needed to provide the best treatmentThis project will fill this critical gap through the development of a tool built from the existing Digital Automated Neurobehavioral AssessmentDANAapp that can collect data at regular intervals via technology tailored towards a cognitively impaired userThis new tool will also help health care providers discriminate between healthy and impaired patients