Workshop: Establishing communication with low responsive patients

The workshop "Establishing communication with low responsive patients - perspectives for cognitive interaction technology" will be held at Bielefeld Universitiy's Excellence Cluster for Cognitive Interaction Technology (CITEC),  from September 2nd to September 5th 2015 starting with a welcome reception on Wednesday (2nd) night. The scientific program will start at 9 a.m. on the 3rd.

This workshop aims to bring together researchers and practitioners in the fields of severe brain damage and disorders of consciousness with scientists and developers in the field of brain-computer interfaces in order to develop neurorehabilitation and communication methods for disorder of consciousness patients.

General outline:
Our goal is to link up medical experts with researchers in the fields of disorders of consciousness (DOC) and brain-computer interfaces (BCI) to jointly explore perspectives for interaction technology that captures and expands windows of conscious awareness in DOC, aiming to establish technology-aided rehabilitation and communication.

The immediate goal of this workshop is three-fold: a) raise public and scientific awareness about severe disorders of consciousness. b) present and exchange cutting-edge research in this field. c) explore technological developments that can be used to identify windows of conscious awareness in DOC patients, expand these windows and finally establish technology-aided cognitive therapies and ultimately communication with the patients. Together, we hope that this will facilitate establishment of new collaborations with national and international researchers.