Baseline measurements + repeatability

[mrlirwin]

Hi all! I’m eagerly awaiting a Brain Gauge in the mail - and am trying to determine how best to use it once it arrives. I’m especially interested in using it as a self-hack tool, to help figure out an ideal protocol for using the ICES on my head to improve cognition.

I may be taking this out of context, but the Cortical Metrics website mentions that one of the BG’s advantages is that it doesn’t require a baseline assessment to be taken. how Does the brain Gauge Measure up to other methods?

I’m not sure I’m phrasing the question quite right, but basically I’m curious about how much normal, day-to-day fluctuation a person would expect to find in their results if they tested themselves every day or multiple times a day. I understand that sleep, diet, exercise, fatigue, etc. can all strongly modulate cognitive behaviour… so I’m guessing that it would be normal to see a relatively wide range of results depending on each of those moment-to-moment factors. Of course, this could make it tricky to determine whether (for example) placing the ICES coils on a certain part of the head was what generated a certain fluctuation in scores… which is why I’m thinking it would probably be best to use the BG daily for a week or so before trying anything with the ICES - to get a baseline read.

Has anyone else tried this out and/or tried testing themselves multiple times a day? @Mark - Am I taking the line from your whitepaper out of context? Would you still recommend gathering a baseline reading - and if so, how long would you recommend gathering if for?

On a related note, how frequently could a person theoretically test themselves before some amount of test-learning / test-adaptation takes place? Basically, can users become better at taking the test by taking it too frequently? This is often an issue other forms of cognitive assessment… so I’m curious whether there’s any data on how often would be too often with the BG.

Thanks for your help!

[bettereveryday]

mrlirwin,

I am not sure whether this will help you.

I can say that, yes, I took the test at various times of the day and night and some of the numbers changed. Fatigue, for instance varies wildly for me and it generally does line up with my lack of sleep, but the very best score for me was at 2 in the morning. I have genuine brain problems and have inverted day for night, so that doesn’t surprise me. I am coming off of a cognitive breakdown about 7 years ago.

What happened for me though, is that some numbers tested at 5% function and TOJ, in particular, didn’t improve no matter what happened with fatigue or the other measures. Also, time passing was something like 26%, and that matches reality. My calendar was a year and a quarter off and I only found out when the vet came to my house when my dog had cancer and he wanted to write something on my calendar. I remember trying to write the date on something and I put the month and the year and looked up and asked my coworker what day it was and he said, “You already have the month and year wrong, so I don’t think it matters.” Even my food cravings are off seasonally. I often crave salad in the Winter and hot dishes in the Summer. Not to mention having my day and night inverted.

Anyway, what happened with me when I used it too often was that I kept seeing that 5% and 26% and my brain plasticity measure was low and I developed performance anxiety - instead of becoming better at taking the test, I became worse and worse and worse. I had to stop taking it as often. I can only emotionally handle taking it once a month.

Hope it helps in some way.

[bettereveryday]

The other thing, which just came to mind, was that because my brain started off so broken, I would genuinely get mentally exhausted halfway through the tests.

I believe that affects my scores, but that the lower scores are accurate.

I have had a lot of brain healing, which hasn’t shown up on the Brain Gauge is another thing.

I have been combining the ICES with things like turmeric and blueberries and kale and broccoli sprouts, 100% cacao, etc. All based on studies.

I healed social anxiety and hallucinations and night terrors and a whole bunch of things and none of those improved my TOJ score. Good mood. Bad mood. No sleep. Sleep. None of it affected my TOJ score.

I say that because there might be people who get discouraged if they can’t bring a score up.

[Hope]

I’ve recently started tracking my brain health. I’m using the home version of the Brain Gauge and the full battery of tests (including the extras). I was interested in the same question of test-retest accuracy/ test-learning. The graphs below show my baseline over the course of 5 days, before any changes were made to my daily routine. Most of the tests were taken after work - but the plot points clumped close together show multiple testing sessions taken on the same day (days off).

I only have a relatively good data set on myself at this point - but my partner is also using the BG (less frequently) and I’ll include slides of their baseline, once It’s been established, if that’s useful. I’ve cut the graph off at the point where I started using PEMF on my head - but will continue to track the progress for a while and then share the results, hopefully in a month or two.

As you can see, there’s both a definite pattern emerging, but also significant daily (and hourly) variation between the tests. If anyone else is willing to share, I’d be very curious to see whether my results are typical or not.