Assistive technology to help persons in a minimally conscious state develop responding and stimulation control: Performance assessment and social rating

Abstract

BACKGROUND:

Post-coma persons in a minimally conscious state (MCS) and with extensive motor impairment and lack of speech tend to be passive and isolated.

OBJECTIVE:

This study aimed to (a) further assess a technology-aided approach for fostering MCS participants’ responding and stimulation control and (b) carry out a social validation check about the approach.

METHODS:

Eight MCS participants were exposed to the aforementioned approach according to an ABAB design. The technology included optic, pressure or touch microswitches to monitor eyelid, hand or finger responses and a computer system that allowed those responses to produce brief periods of positive stimulation during the B (intervention) phases of the study. Eighty-four university psychology students and 42 care and health professionals were involved in the social validation check.

RESULTS:

The MCS participants showed clear increases in their response frequencies, thus producing increases in their levels of environmental stimulation input, during the B phases of the study. The students and care and health professionals involved in the social validation check rated the technology-aided approach more positively than a control condition in which stimulation was automatically presented to the participants.

CONCLUSIONS:

A technology-aided approach to foster responding and stimulation control in MCS persons may be effective and socially desirable.