USC med school students working on memory-prompting technology

What if you could catch Alzheimer’s patients early in their slide into dementia, capture their fond memories in visual forms and then show them those memories months or years later?

Two University of South Carolina School of Medicine students think they have the format to do just that.

Now come the more important questions: Could it keep the memories alive longer? Could it help stimulate other associated memories? Or might it just invoke a few smiles in an extremely difficult stage of life?

These are the things Sean Christensen and Rob Gereige think about when they’re not studying for exams during their second year of medical school. They already had worked with a friend, Regis Blanc, to start a pseudo social media web site called TimeStash.com, which uses pop culture videos and photos to prompt interaction among like-minded users. That was just for fun, and aimed at a younger crowd.

The reactions to TimeStash, however, set their active minds to thinking.

“We’re in medical school, and I’ve always wanted to do something tech-related in medicine,” Gereige said. “I started pondering how I could use the technology behind TimeStash.com and apply it for medical purposes.”

How about using a similar process to prompt memories buried in the minds of Alzheimer’s patients.

“Think about childhood memories,” Christensen said. “When you think of one, they come in associations or clusters. By catching one, you’re able to start a chain reaction of other things that are associated. Tap into one memory and grab as much as you can from that open door.”

To do that, they came up with a variation on TimeStash, which they call Hourglass (www.hourglassalbum.com). Rather than relying solely on pop cultural images, Hourglass is designed to allow a facilitator to work with a patient. The facilitator might interview the Alzheimer’s patient or a family member to come up with personalized images to load into a computer.

For instance, one patient recalled learning to read decades ago using the Baby Ray primers put out in the early 1900s. Images of the Baby Ray readers can be found online. The patient’s face lit up when she saw the images.

“We can’t go so far yet to say its therapeutic, but we’ve seen that people who have fading memory enjoy being able to basically reunite with their past,” Christensen said.

How is this different from pulling out an old scrapbook? Gereige and Blanc, who attends school in Switzerland, came up with algorithms to best mix family photos or videos with cultural memories from a specific region and era and package them in the right format online.

“I initially listened to them and thought this was just another website,” said Dr. Victor Hirth, chief of the division of geriatrics at the school of medicine. “It isn’t. I think they have hit on something.”

The software is easily adaptable and lends itself to research. It was pilot tested on non-dementia patients in the geriatrics unit at Palmetto Health Richland. “They’re not feeling well, and you can take them back to their childhood,” Hirth said.

They click on the images that bring back memories, and their anxiety levels go down. A few more clicks, and their ailments are pushed to the back of their minds.

A similar therapy called Music & Memory has passed scientific testing hurdles. Hourglass is just getting started on that path.

Christensen and Gereige have talked with a local college class about gathering pop cultural references by interviewing family members. That will help build the database for different eras. Also, an intern in the geriatrics department at Palmetto Health will be gathering data from tests with patients this summer. Measurements of heart rate and respiration will show if the images are triggering the proper response.

Who knows where it goes from there.

Christensen and Gereige aren’t hung up on marketing or cashing in on their work. For now, they’re more concerned with finishing their second year of medical school. They appreciate that some instructors have allowed them to leave classes early to make presentations about Hourglass.

Christensen is originally from Greenwood and went to college at the University of California-Berkeley. Gereige is from the Washington, D.C. area and went to Catholic University there.

They haven’t focused yet on their specific medical paths. Christensen is leaning toward neuropsychiatry. Gereige just wants some outlet for mixing technology and medicine.

That could be Hourglass.

This story was originally published May 12, 2015 at 11:59 AM with the headline "USC med school students working on memory-prompting technology."