Neues Produkt von Bob Thatchers Neuroguide

PRODUCT HIGHLIGHT ACR - Automatic Clinical Report Writer The Automatic Clinical Report Writer (ACR) analyzes a properly edited QEEG and prepares all the necessary summaries, descriptions, treatment recommendations with supporting outputs automatically in report form that is in a format which meets professional society and third party standards.  The first page of the report summarizes the patient information and the findings of the report.  You are able to customize the header to use your clinic's logo and letterhead. The second page includes a detailed narrative with neurofeedback recommendations. Depending on which networks are selected the ACR provides a written summary of deviations in each network with neurofeedback training recommendations which can be easily converted into a training protocol.  These findings are also summarized into easy-to-interpret radial plots. The ACR summarizes the surface electrical activity in the form of z-score brain maps which summarize the deviation of the patient's surface activity from ANI's FDA registered normative database.  A sample EEG with the FFT plot (showing both the raw and z-score values) are also provided. The ACR also summarizes Electrical Neuroimaging findings showing the Broadmann area deviations from ANI's LORETA database, in the form of radial plots and LORETA images. The z-score maps for each 1Hz band are provided for both Linked Ears and Laplacian derivations. The z-score maps for connectivity measures are also provided. If selected (in cases where a Traumatic Brain Injury is present) the report automatically provides the Traumatic Brain Injury Discriminant analysis indicating the severity of the TBI (based on electrophysiological data which needs to be confirmed with the clinical findings).  Other possible comparisons are the Learning Disability Discriminant and the Brain Performance Index.  These 3 options are only available if these options have been purchased seperately. Finally, the reliability of the recording and all the technical and scientific parameters used by NeuroGuide™ including references to the scientific publications supporting each of the outputs provided is included in the last 4 pages of the report. Thatcher's Thoughts   The growth of the field of qEEG depends on flattening the learning curve and making qEEG report writing not only accurate but also easy to do.  Most QEEG systems, and especially NeuroGuide™ generate numerous outputs in the form of tables, graphs, brain maps and LORETA outputs.  From all these outputs the pertinent ones have to be selected and integrated into a report.  A proper and valid report needs to meet certain criteria: It should summarize how and with what settings the recording was done (technical information), summarize the findings with support from selected tables and maps, how the patient compares against age matched norms with supporting outputs. Broadmann areas that deviate from norm, or may explain the symptoms, should include supporting LORETA outputs, and finally treatment recommendations should be included based on all of the abovementioned information.  The report should meet the criteria of good practices of the governing professional organization(s) as well as being acceptable for third parties for reimbursement. In the past, those that were trained and/or had experience in EEG and QEEG would spend a fair amount of time preparing a report.  Those clinicians who did not have the experience or time to write a QEEG report would send the results to outside services to write the report whose turn-around time could include days of delays. These services were often inadequate with unknown and untrained individuals that produced low quality analyses using back yard special databases that had no scientific validity, etc.  Also, by sending data to a 3rd party the clinician was not empowered to tailor the data to fit the symptoms of their patients.  Also, courts often reject reports produced  by outside  companies because there is no line of custody of the EEG data and because of the unknown and/or unscientific normative databases and analyses that are used. As Applied Neuroscience, Inc. grew, clinicians often complained that they did not have the time or expertise to prepare reports.  Also, the learning curve was steep  and intimidating and it turned off clinicians that did not have the time to learn how to analyze the EEG, save the bitmaps, and write a clinical report. Initially, word processing templates helped but the cutting and pasting of the appropriate outputs still took up too much time.  Finally, I consulted the ANI team to see if we could come up with a way to empower the clinician to create a report that was of high quality and could be run  on their own computers in a few minutes so that they did not need to send their  data to a 3rd party.    It was not easy but  after a number of products and revisions we were able to come up with an automatic report writer that met professional standards and legal standards which produced a complete report with images and narratives in less than one minute on the clinician's own computer. The end result of all these efforts is the Automatic Clinical Report writer (ACR) that is highlighted in this newsletter.  The ACR automatically takes an edited EEG and within 1 minute prepares a multi page well documented QEEG report.  The ACR is an invaluable tool to the trained clinician, and will empower the less experienced clinician by preparing the pertinent details of the patient's QEEG findings in a well documented, standardized report.  Most important, it significantly flattens  the learning curve for clinicians new to QEEG. May a healthy brain guide all your endeavours. Best wishes, Robert Thatcher, PhD

ACR is a per use product so you can purchase as many as you need and conveniently buy on-line from our website. For more information on the ACR or to order ACR units, CLICK HERE To view an instructional video explaining the ACR, or other videos for learning how to use NeuroGuide™ CLICK HERE