The results of the schizophrenic group were unexpected with regard to the well-known general and serious disturbance of the sensory systems in the illness. They may be explained by compensatory and readapting processes in schizophrenia, not to mention the great variability seen in most schizophrenic studies, where rating methods are used.
Since then our research-group has searched for other acoustic stimuli, which may differentiate schizophrenic subjects from other diagnostic study-groups. This was supposed to be possible with specific types of acoustic stimuli, as it may be anticipated that the processing of acoustic stimuli in the schizophrenic brain is different from that of non-schizophrenics. The schizophrenic individuals report lots of aberrant acoustic experiences - the hearing of faint or reinforced sounds, including coherent "voices", and more. Their auditory perception is disturbed and aberrant acoustic experiences are core symptoms of the disease.

Successive studies revealed that perceptual aberrations related to schizophrenia were possible to discover by investigating sound-illusions. These illusions target fine discrimination of elements of sound, which in turn governs the final perception. This discrimination and further synthesis of neural activity takes place in subcortical areas, i.e. at a subconscious, pre-attentive level. These processes are obviously disturbed in schizophrenia. SensoDetect comprises electrophysiological registration of brain-activity in connection with stimulation by schizophrenia-sensitive sound-samples.

 

 

 

Company profile

SensoDetect AB (former SchizoDetect) is a medical technical company seated in Lund, Sweden. The company has created and developed a new method of support for diagnostic evaluation of schizophrenia. Such support is required in many areas of clinical psychiatry. Reported symptoms may during long periods of time be indistinct, and clinical investigation is often introduced late in the development of the disease. It is important to medicate early for a better prognosis. The method - mastered in professional hands - will improve the validity of the diagnosis, and this may be crucial in e.g. forensic psychiatry.

SensoDetect relies on the fact that processes of sorting and integration of sensory stimuli within the nervous system function in an aberrant way in schizophrenia. Samples of such aberrations regarding psychoacoustic mechanisms have been collected and tested during many years of research. They now constitute the basis of the method.

Samples of stimuli shown to distinguish between schizophrenic and non-schizophrenic individuals are, during testing presented to subjects in a specified clinical setting. Stimulation parameters and measuring technology are the original parts of the invention (SensoDetect). Markers of the disease are collected by treating data from simultaneous BSRA - measurements. Results and predictive value of each testing are then communicated to the physician requesting the investigation.

SensoDetect rests on basic psychoacoustic research. In our case this started in 1983 and was trigged by findings in studies of emotional experiences of symphonic compositions. Schizophrenics as a group did not experience symphonic music in significantly different ways compared to non-schizophrenics. This was in contrast with other diagnostic groups such as depressives, anxiety neurotics, obsessive neurotics, hysterical neurotics and manic psychotics who all showed illness-specific aberrations.