CABHI conference disrupts and reimag ines the experience of aging

BY NEIL ZEIDENBERG

The Centre for Aging + Brain Health Innovation (CABHI), based in Toronto at Baycrest Health Sciences, held its 5th annual CABHI conference in late March with the theme “Daring to Disrupt: Reimagining the Aging Experience.” This year’s event brought together over 1,350 participants from over 30 countries all focused on innovations in age-related technology.

Seniors are said to be the backbone of society. By 2051, it’s believed that one in four Canadians will be 65 or over. Understandably, over the next two decades, it’s also predicted there will be a substantial increase in cases of Alzheimer’s disease, dementia, and other chronic diseases.

“There are 600,000 Canadians currently living with Alzheimer’s and dementia and the costs to treat these indi- viduals will reach over $16 billion by 2030,” said Jean-Yves Duclos, the federal Minister of Health. “That’s why the Government of Canada is supporting innovators like CABHI, with $44 million since 2015, and a further $30 million for the next three years, to help older adults and their caregivers.”

New technologies are helping seniors to age at home, while maintaining their cognitive, emotional and physical health.

He added, they aim to help seniors safely age-in-place while maintaining their cognitive, emotional, and physical well-being.

Winner of this year’s People’s Choice Award went to LUCID (https://lucidtherapeutics.com), an AI-powered digital solution that transforms music into medicine. Personalizing therapeutic music experiences based on real-time mood, LUCID targets a wide range of health conditions, and symptoms like anxiety and agitation.

Historically, CABHI has held a pitch competition at its annual summits. This year, CABHI showcased finalists in three of its funding programs.

First were the finalists of the Mentorship, Capital & Continuation (MC2) program, in partnership with National Bank. This is a venture-like funding program where CABHI helps innovators scale and grow their companies. Winners can receive up to $400,000 from CABHI, plus matching funding from CABHI partners including: Ontario Brain Institute, Greyhill Capital Partners, Ontario Bioscience Innovation Organization, and financing from Clearco.

Then there was also a showcase of the finalists of the Spark program. In this program, winners will receive up to $50,000 to help front-line clinicians and researchers turn their ideas into prototypes or launch their solutions.

Some of the current cohort finalist projects include:

• Check your hearing, Change your life: Hearing loss can significantly reduce quality of life and reduce independence. This project uses an online hearing screening tool with a Baycrest audiologist to estimate a client’s hearing status.

• To help dementia patients living in social isolation, Bruyere, in Ottawa, is providing clients with a virtual reality companion headset. Clients can hear a computer-generated companion speak to them, helping to alleviate social isolation.

• Home Care Workers Co-operative: A virtual caregiver support program that reaches out to the wider PSW community, asking them to connect to share their experiences; finding tools to support caregivers and bringing people together.

• Baycrest is using VR as a non-pharmacological leisure intervention. VR can improve quality of life and improve outcomes.

UHN – Immersive VR Therapy: rest and relaxation. Clients can select from a variety of videos; in 20-minute sessions patients are safe and engaged, leaving a lasting impact. It’s also entertaining and can help improve memory.

And the third showcase highlighted CABHI’s new Discover and Adopt (D+A) program designed to help companies get their solutions adopted into the health ecosystem. During the D+A showcase, participants discussed solving the adoption problem. Although many great services exist to improve quality of life, unfortunately