Prof Luc de Witte to deliver keynote at South Korean rehabilitation symposium

Prof Luc de Witte will be delivering a keynote talk at the International Symposium on Rehabilitation Research 2018 in Seoul, South Korea on 20 June 2018.

Presentations now available: King's Fund Annual Conference

Interested on how the speakers think we can "future-proof" the healthcare system? then why not have a listen to what they had to say?

Presentations can be accessed via this link.

Alzheimers Research UK - FREE open public meeting

Where? Showroom & Workstation, Cafe - 15 Paternoster Row, Sheffield, S1 2BX
When? Tuesday 30th Sepember,17:00-20:00
What? Prof Fangi will give a key note lecture, and another presentation from the Alzheimers Research UK Network Yorkshire Branch members from Sheffield, Leeds, Bradford, Hull and York. Topics will cover a mixture of basic science and clinical research.

To view the agenda or to register, please click here.

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Gail Mountain presents on knowledge transfer relating to KT-EQUAL

Professor Gail Mountain was one of the presenters of a seminar convened by AgeUK on creating impact at the British Society of Gerontology Annual Conference, titled "Global Ageing: Implications for Individuals and Societies".  Gail spoke about the learning that came out of KT-EQUAL, a consortium of UK researchers dedicated to extending quality life for older and disabled people.  Other speakers included John Beard from the World Health Organisation (WHO) and Paul Cann from AgeUK Oxford. There was standing room only for this popular event.

Gail Mountain was also keynote speaker at the launch of the Ageing and Assisted living network, University of Essex on 17th September.  The audience of over 100 included academics, health and social care practitioners and commissioners, members of the lay public, service users and industry.

Mark Hawley to give keynote lecture at Workshop on Speech and Language Processing for Assistive Technologies (SLPAT)

Mark Hawley has been invited to give the keynote lecture at this year’s Workshop on Speechand Language Processing for Assistive Technologies (SLPAT) in Grenoble on 21-22 August. His talk will be entitled ‘Speech and Language Processing for Assistive Technologies in practice: lessons from translational research'.

The talk will distil experience and results from several projects, over more than a decade, which have researched and developed the application of speech recognition as an input modality for assistive technology (AT). Current interfaces to AT for people with severe physical disabilities, such as switch-scanning, can be prohibitively slow and tiring to use. Many people with severe physical disabilities also have some speech, though many also have poor control of speech articulators, leading to dysarthria. Nonetheless, recognition of dysarthric speech can give people more control options than using body movement alone. Speech can therefore be an attractive option for AT input.

Techniques that have been developed for optimising the recognition of dysarthric speech will be described, resulting in recognition rates of greater than 80% for people with even the most severe dysarthria. Speech recognition has been applied as a means of controlling the home (via an environmental control system) and, probably for the first time, as a means of controlling a communication aid. The development of the Voice Input Voice Output Communication Aid (VIVOCA) will be described and some early results of its evaluation presented (see previous blog post for open access to the project's most recent publication).

The talk will discuss some of the lessons learnt from these projects, such as:

·       The need to work in interdisciplinary teams including speech technologists, speech and language therapists, health researchers and assistive technologists

·       The value of user-centred design, involving users in defining their wants and needs and then working with them, in an iterative manner, to refine the AT such that it becomes usable and acceptable

·       The gap that exists between the results that can be achieved in the lab and those achievable in people’s homes under real usage conditions –something that is not often covered in research papers

·       The practical approaches that can be applied to optimising recognition for individuals. It is often possible to make significant improvements in recognition rates by altering the configuration of the AT set-up.

The talk will conclude by describing some of the future potential applications of speech technology that are being developed, or considered, for people with disabilities as well as for frail older people and people with long-term conditions.

[Written by Mark Hawley]

RATs at RAatE

At the end of November, several members of the RAT group attended the Recent Advances in Assistive Technology and Engineering (RAatE) conference in Coventry.

•  Professor Mark Hawley was invited to give a keynote speech on The relationship between assistive technology service provision and AT research and development. 

• Dr Peter Cudd co-ordinated and presented at a showcase of European research, exploring the potential connection between RAatE and the Association for the Advancement of Assistive Technology in Europe

• Dr Simon Judge chaired a session on service developments in assistive technology

• Professor Pam Enderby presented on Reviewing Outcome Measures.