#mmproject

Born to two talented parents, Orpheus becomes the greatest musician in all of Greece. He has Apollo to thank for that too — he taught him how to play the lyre. After traveling with Jason & The Argonauts, Orpheus fell in love with Eurydice but things end up taking a tragic turn.

Orpheus and Eurydice’s marriage is doomed from the beginning. Hymen, the Greek god of marriage, doesn’t bless their wedding, and Eurydice dies soon after the nuptials after being bitten by a snake. Devastated, Orpheus travels to the Underworld and make a deal with Hades and Persephone: if Orpheus can walk  o the surface without looking back, Eurydice will return to life. Orpheus fails.

Jude was seven when her parents were murdered and she and her two sisters were stolen away to live in the treacherous High Court of Faerie. Ten years later, Jude wants nothing more than to belong there, despite her mortality. But many of the fey despise humans. Especially Prince Cardan, the youngest and wickedest son of the High King. To win a place at the Court, she must defy him–and face the consequences.

Buffy Summers has just been brought back from the dead thanks to her friends so when a demon is summoned turning everything into a musical, secrets that were meant to be kept secret are unearthed. To lure Buffy to him, Sweet kidnaps Dawn and during their confrontation the slayer almost dances herself to death but a certain vampire with a charming British accent prevents it from happening.

At this stage, my project intends to examine neurological abnormalities in patients presenting with hallucinations in individuals across functional and organic diagnoses using a ‘big data’ approach, in order to elucidate associations and pathological differences. Here are my main points to introduce the topic: 

Hallucinations occur across diagnoses: they are complex and multifactorial – they can present in many ways (auditory, visual, olfactory etc.), and there are numerous theories and explanations on the neurological origin, which is complicated by its varied nature and presence across different diagnoses.

Neuroimaging is being used to explore abnormalities: the evidence generated by neuroimaging studies on hallucinations are stronger in organic hallucinations than in functional, however despite the slow progress and limitations, neuropsychiatric imaging studies are still carried out because of the great potential it has to expand and transform our knowledge on diagnostic criteria, phenotypes and pharmacology

Functional vs. Organic distinction: Although it should, the neurological and psychological features of disorders across this distinction are not always seen as connected. Identifying the abnormalities associated with hallucinations, a symptom that exists across this separation could lead towards closing this gap. 

CRIS suitability for this topic: using the CRIS dataset will allow for identifying cases (including rare cases) across the functional/organic distinction, allowing for a richer understanding. In addition, CRIS has the potential to generate a larger cohort than previous studies. 

The title of my project has been provisionally developed as:

Neuropsychiatric associations with auditory and visual hallucinations: a CRIS project

I am currently working on my proposal, although it is taking longer than I thought it would as I try to work out and refine what I am actually trying to explore. I stumbled across a great resource to guide writing a proposal, below! It might be worth making a page especially for tools that I am using, for easier access. 

UPDATE (20/3/17): ‘Resources’ page has been added to the blog navigation menu