Project details

Summary

What is the study about?

This study looks at how people with cognitive or memory problems describe their difficulties in daily life. We are also interested to see how your speech pattern may change over time.

At present it often takes a long time before memory problems are diagnosed accurately. We hope that in the future we can use CognoSpeak, so no-one misses out on an early assessment and has access to support or treatment.

What are you trying to find out?

The aim of this study is to understand whether patients with either memory complaints or suspected movement disorders (such as Parkinson’s disease), thosewho have suffered a Stroke and healthy volunteers can talk to a computerised doctor (CognoSpeak) regarding their neurological health.

We want to find out if we can measure memory, mood and thinking ability using a computerised doctor called “CognoSpeak”. CognoSpeak is a human looking image on a computer screen that will ask you questions regarding your health. The answers will be analysed by a computer program to look for changes in speech due to memory problems and/or mood.

If CognoSpeak proves to be a good tool for measuring this, we will hopefully use it in the future use it to help assess people referred to prioritise memory clinic referrals and make the service more efficient.

What does taking part involve?

If you are interested in the study, you will be asked to read the information sheet and sign a consent form. We will ask if you would like to take part from your own home (if you have access to technology) or if you would like to do it at the hospital or a community centre. You can be accompanied by family, a carer or a friend if you would like. The research team will provide instructions for you to access CognoSpeak.

You will be asked to:

• Talk to the computerised doctor “CognoSpeak”
• Complete mood and anxiety questionnaires
• Complete a feedback questionnaire

We may also need to do a cognitive and quality of life assessment with you These questions and assessments will take about 45-60 minutes of your time.

If you have been recruited from a hospital clinic or GP centre, we will ask to collect information from your GP and hospital records. This may require access to them several years after your assessment, so we know if you have developed dementia. If you have taken part via Join Dementia Research (JDR) or other self-referral we will not ask to access your medical records or require you to have memory test.

Who is it for?

We are looking for healthy volunteers, people with memory problems, people with movement disorders and stroke survivors to help us with this research study. 

Why is it important? 

We do not anticipate any immediate benefits to you for taking part in this study; however, the information from this research will be used to help improve future health services by understanding the ways in which people with memory or other cognitive problems talk about their problems. If people are able to talk to a computerised person, this may be used in primary care or even at a person’s home to screen for dementia.

How can I find out more?

You can find out more information about taking part in this study by downloading the key documents at the top of this page. You can also visit the CognoSpeak project website here. 

If you are interested in taking part in this study, or have questions for the research team, click the button below to email us:

Email the research team