Robot Psychologist: Changing Mental Health Services with MindMentor

Two clinical psychologists associated with the Institute for Eclectic Psychology in Holland, Jaap Hollander and Jeffrey Wijnberg, have developed the first robot psychologist, named "MindMentor." MindMentor is an online computer program that helps people solve problems and achieve goals. It has the unique quality, as compared with other on line psychological help systems, of requiring no live human intervention and being completely automated. Said Hollander in an interview with a Dutch radio program: "What made this whole endeavour exciting, was that we suddenly saw a possibility to create an unlimited amount of psychological help."

Several Dutch media have reported on this new form of mental health care. Guido Castagna, reporting for daily newspaper "Spits," noted after trying out MindMentor for himself: "For close to an hour MindMentor and his colleagues keep me very busy. I am shown colored pictures of abstract figures, I am asked to relive situations and I am cheerily debunked by ProvoBot, who claims my problem is unsolvable. In the beginning I still agree with him, but when he shows up again later in the session, I just laugh at him and point him out the virtual door. Then the amazement hits me: is this really going to work? The solution to my problem is in sight."

Some psychologists have responded positively to their robot colleague. Said David Van Nuys, Ph.D. (Emeritus Professor of Psychology Sonoma State University): "At the end of the hour-long session, I have to say my outlook and spirits were lifted considerably. It was smart, supportive, fun, and funny and helped me to focus in on the central issue. I find the blend of artificial intelligence, NLP, and other goal-directed therapeutic techniques effective."

How effective is the robot psychologist? Hollander, interviewed by a Dutch radio program, explained: "We did some research into the effectiveness of this system in 2006. We had a much more primitive version then, and with that we performed a test-run with 1600 clients from all over the world. Our data show that MindMentor was able to solve the problems for 47% in just one session. When people were asked afterwards to what extent they had solved the problem with the help of the robot psychologist, 100% meaning totally solved and 0% meaning absolutely no change, the average result was 47%. We believe that this is a success percentage that any real life psychologist would be satisfied with, especially given the fact that this was after just one session."

Visit MindMentor @ http://www.mindmentor.com

CDC Claims US Free of Rabies

According to a report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Friday, the United States is free of the dog specific form of rabies known as canine rabies.

This does not mean all rabies has gone, only the strain that can be transmitted from dog to dog. It is still rife in the bat, racoon and skunk population and dogs and humans can still become infected if bitten by one of these animals.

Chief of the CDC Rabies Program, Dr Charles Rupprecht, said that:

"The elimination of canine rabies in the United States represents one of the major public health success stories in the last 50 years."

"However, there is still much work to be done to prevent and control rabies globally," he added.

The announcement coincided with World Rabies Day, but Dr Deborah Briggs, Executive Director of Alliance for Rabies Control said the CDC news should be seen as more than a "one day event":

"This is the first-step in a long-term effort towards human rabies prevention and animal rabies control globally."

Over the last decades US state and local public health authorities have been "working tirelessly" to prevent and control rabies said the CDC in a prepared statement. Rupprecht expressed his thanks to the "tremendous historical efforts at the state and local levels over the past several decades".

"Our public health infrastructure, including our quarantine stations, local animal control programs, veterinarians, and clinicians all play a vital role in preserving the canine-rabies-free status in the US," said Rupprecht.

A three pronged strategy of dog vaccination, licensing, and controlling stray dogs has helped to eliminate canine rabies from the US. Rupprecht said canine rabies could be eliminated in the Western Hemisphere.

Risks still exists however, and a major one is the adoption of dogs into the US from other countries. This highlights the need for global control, at local and national levels, said the CDC statement. The US must continue to be vigilant and continue with the three pronged strategy to maintain its status as a canine rabies free country.

Despite being preventable in humans, rabies, a viral disease, still kills 55,000 people globally every year, equivalent to one person dying of rabies ever 10 minutes.

Infection is usually through being bitten by a rabid animal. The incubation period in humans is typically one to three months, and more rarely, up to one year or more*. It can be prevented with a vaccine but once symptoms emerge it is too late and the patient is unlikely to survive as it is almost impossible to treat.

According to the CDC, the vast majority of rabies cases reported each year are in wild animals such as raccoons, skunks, bats and foxes. Fewer than 10 per cent of reported cases are in domestic animals such as cats, cattle and dogs.

The virus infects the nervous system and causes encephalopathy (brain disease) which leads to death. Early symptoms are non specific: fever, headache, generally feeling unwell. As the disease progresses, other neurological symptoms emerge: insomnia, anxiety confusion, slight or partial paralysis, agitation, hallucinations, difficulty swallowing, and hydrophobia (fear of water).

Once symptoms emerge, death usually follows a few days later.

While the canine strain has been eliminated in the US, humans can still catch it from wild animals, and bats are a particular threat. Rupprecht urged people to continue to have their pets vaccinated.

"The elimination of dog-to-dog transmission of rabies does not mean that people in the US can stop vaccinating their pets against rabies," warned Rupprecht.

"Rabies is ever-present in wildlife and can be transmitted to dogs or other pets. We need to stay vigilant."

Insulin and Blood Glucose Concentration

Scientists at the leading Swedish medical university Karolinska Institutes have resolved the mystery of how insulin-secreting cells maintain an appropriate number of ATP sensing ion channel proteins on their surface. This mechanism, which is described in the latest issue of Cell Metabolism, explains how the human body can keep the blood glucose concentration within the normal range and thereby avoid the development of diabetes.

Blood sugar absorbed from food is timed to enter muscles as energy supply as well as the liver and fat tissue for energy storage. Otherwise, diabetes occurs. Such glucose transport is precisely controlled by insulin, the body's only hormone capable of lowering blood sugar. This hormone is released from insulin-secreting cells in the pancreas.

The ion channel proteins that are regulated by ATP and that transport potassium ions (KATP channels) are situated on the surface of the insulin-secreting cells to sense blood sugar and control sugar-stimulated insulin secretion. However, it has been a long-standing mystery how the insulin-secreting cells keep an appropriate number of KATP channels on their surface. Scientists at the the Rolf Luft Research Center for Diabetes and Endocrinology, Karolinska Institutet, have now disclosed a new traffic route whereby sugar promotes the insulin secretion controller KATP channel to march to its post.

Only two routes were believed to operate in insulin-secreting cells to deliver the macromolecules newly manufactured or modified inside cells to the cell surface. One is referred to as a regulated insulin secretory pathway, while the other is termed a constitutive pathway to renew cell surface lipids and proteins including KATP channels.

"We have now found that the newly manufactured KATP channels in insulin-secreting cells reside in a non-insulin-containing structure, which contains the regulated secretory granule marker chromogranin," says Per-Olof Berggren. "Such a structure moves to the cell surface subsequent to elevation of sugar concentration in a Ca2+- and protein kinase A-dependent fashion."

According to Professor Berggren the discovery is very important. This entirely new traffic route endows insulin-secreting cells with an efficient way to maintain an appropriate number of KATP channels on their surface, enabling them to adequately keep the blood glucose concentration within the normal range thus avoiding the development of diabetes.

Article adapted by Medical News Today from original press release.