Multiple Sclerosis is known as a chronic disease of the central nervous system, with a wide variety of motor and sensory symptoms that can lead to work disability, socioeconomic burden, and reduced quality of life for patients and caregivers. In Portugal, the estimated prevalence is 6,500 people with this condition. The project aims to discover whether patients with multiple sclerosis exhibit deficits in social memory and to reveal the underlying neural substrates of a possible dysfunction, which may trigger the development of therapeutic approaches targeting this cognitive dysfunction.

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Hospital de Braga avalia memória com jogo interativo em pacientes com esclerose múltipla
Reproduced image of the project.

Publication type: Project Summary
Original title: Memória de doentes com esclerose múltipla é testada através de jogo interativo
Project location: Braga Hospital
Project publication date: 11 December 2023
Source: Jornal Médico
Participating entities: Braga Hospital, Centro Clínico Académico (2CA-Braga) and Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York

What is the goal and target audience?
     The project aims to discover whether patients with multiple sclerosis exhibit deficits in social memory and to reveal the underlying neural substrates of a possible dysfunction, which may trigger the development of therapeutic approaches targeting this cognitive dysfunction.

What is the context?
     Multiple Sclerosis is known as a chronic disease of the central nervous system, with a wide variety of motor and sensory symptoms that can lead to work disability, socioeconomic burden, and reduced quality of life for patients and caregivers. In Portugal, the estimated prevalence is 6,500 people with this condition.

What does the project consist of?
     The project consists of inviting patients to play a virtual game, while inside the MRI machine, “study participants have the possibility to interact with different virtual characters”. “The way they interact with the characters allows us to infer about the memory that the participants are processing, extracting measures that we can relate to neuroimaging data” as explained by Torcato Meira, a physician from the Neuroradiology Service.

What are the results obtained? What are the main conclusions of these results?
     The project already presents some useful clinical results. “At the moment, we have already been able to quantify how the total lesion volume that these patients have in the brain relates to worse social cognitive performance”, says Torcato Meira. According to the Neuroanatomy lecturer, healthy participants “activate expected brain areas to perform the task in question, unlike patients with multiple sclerosis, who do not recruit these regions”. Therefore, these data suggest that, in addition to structural lesions, patients with multiple sclerosis exhibit functional changes that may underlie these deficits, never before reported in multiple sclerosis.

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Home / Publications / Publication

Hospital de Braga avalia memória com jogo interativo em pacientes com esclerose múltipla
Reproduced image of the project.

Publication type: Project Summary
Original title: Memória de doentes com esclerose múltipla é testada através de jogo interativo
Project location: Braga Hospital
Project publication date: 11 December 2023
Source: Jornal Médico
Participating entities: Braga Hospital, Centro Clínico Académico (2CA-Braga) and Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York

What is the goal and target audience?
     The project aims to discover whether patients with multiple sclerosis exhibit deficits in social memory and to reveal the underlying neural substrates of a possible dysfunction, which may trigger the development of therapeutic approaches targeting this cognitive dysfunction.

What is the context?
     Multiple Sclerosis is known as a chronic disease of the central nervous system, with a wide variety of motor and sensory symptoms that can lead to work disability, socioeconomic burden, and reduced quality of life for patients and caregivers. In Portugal, the estimated prevalence is 6,500 people with this condition.

What does the project consist of?
     The project consists of inviting patients to play a virtual game, while inside the MRI machine, “study participants have the possibility to interact with different virtual characters”. “The way they interact with the characters allows us to infer about the memory that the participants are processing, extracting measures that we can relate to neuroimaging data” as explained by Torcato Meira, a physician from the Neuroradiology Service.

What are the results obtained? What are the main conclusions of these results?
     The project already presents some useful clinical results. “At the moment, we have already been able to quantify how the total lesion volume that these patients have in the brain relates to worse social cognitive performance”, says Torcato Meira. According to the Neuroanatomy lecturer, healthy participants “activate expected brain areas to perform the task in question, unlike patients with multiple sclerosis, who do not recruit these regions”. Therefore, these data suggest that, in addition to structural lesions, patients with multiple sclerosis exhibit functional changes that may underlie these deficits, never before reported in multiple sclerosis.

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