July 2022
Esther Brill is a PhD student in cognitive neuroscience at the University Hospital of Old Age Psychiatry and Psychotherapy Bern. As a digital native she considers connecting technology and clinical work essential to fight ever more prevalent neurodegenerative diseases such as dementia. Computerized cognition games like the ones she currently deploys in collaboration with the ARTORG Center could be key in this, both as therapy and in prevention.
Esther, what is the topic of your PhD project?
My project is about serious game-based cognitive training for older adults who are either at risk for developing dementia due to Alzheimer’s disease or that are already diagnosed with a cognitive impairment related to dementia. We use an in-house developed tablet-based training approach as non-invasive tool to attenuate cognitive decline. Another crucial aspect of my research is imaging. Here we use MRI to explicitly investigate the functional and structural neuronal underpinnings of the expected training benefits.
What motivates you about your work?
I’ve always been fascinated with neuropsychological research and its different approaches. After my studies in psychology, I specifically looked for a PhD-project that combines both scientific research and clinical work. I really appreciate the close contact with patients. During and after training they frequently report that they subjectively feel an improvement in their cognition and quality of life. That’s very reassuring and certainly a major encouragement to pursue this line of research.
I definitely want to stay in neurological and psychological research. I am open to any research in this field. But my current project is encouraging me to keep investigating neurodegenerative diseases and fighting cognitive decline to the benefit of those affected. With the steep rise in elderly persons and numbers of dementia expected to more than double in Switzerland between 2019 and 2050, I believe that computerized cognitive training can not only be a treatment option but also an easily accessible preventive mechanism relieving the burden on both society as well as the healthcare system.
Technology can create innovative ways towards better, individualized treatment.
How can being a member of CAIM promote you in your career?
I really like the concept of CAIM in connecting researchers from different fields and especially appreciate its mission and translational nature. Since I am a digital native, I think it’s really important to connect technology and clinical work to create innovative ways towards faster and better individualized treatment. Towards this goal, we work very closely with the ARTORG Center to allow frequent exchange of ideas, which is important as I am now planning to focus on the data analysis part of my project. We have the psychological and cognitive perspective, and they have the engineering viewpoint in developing motivating games for our users.
I also like the initiative for more diversity that CAIM has launched and have attended the first research lunch talk. I think diversity is about equity and inclusion. Both are qualities that I value and in my opinion allow a worthwhile multi-perspective approach to any kind of research.
