This morning I received my usual TED talk email and was literally brought to tears watching the TED presentation by Nancy Frates, the mother of Pete Frates, who came down with ALS a couple of years ago. It was Pete and Nancy and their family who put together the ALS campaign that included the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge. It then became a smash hit this past Summer. In her TED talk, Nancy details how it all began with Pete’s diagnosis, Pete saying he wanted to get this in front of philanthropists such as Bill Gates, and to dividing up the various responsibilities of their campaign.
I earlier wrote about the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge fundraising campaign as it was becoming a Summer sensation. My interest is partly in that I’ve been involved in fundraising, but more out of my personal interests and challenges in living with the disorder, hydrocephalus, since 1992. The effects from my hydrocephalus have been considerable. I lost all of my work and related skills after an auto accident that caused it. And it took 16 years, 7 surgeries, and much of my own making to finally get a CNS shunt to do what they are supposed to do – properly clear CSF fluid & pressure from my brain. Out of survival, like the Frates did, I became involved in advocacy for hydrocephalus, and this led me to efforts with the Food & Drug Administration (FDA) and their oversight of problems with CNS shunts, which are the medical devices principally used in the treatment of hydrocephalus. In 1996, I learned of a leading CNS shunt having specific problems that I suspected was connected to my poor health, and I reported this to the Food & Drug Administration. Then I learned it was likely responsible for thousands of additional surgeries and poor outcomes over 10 plus years. Some in the field knew about this, but nothing was done to change it. So I petitioned the FDA. It took me over a year to gather the studies and assemble it all. And I did this all in spite of considerable health & cognitive challenges.
In 1998, FDA upheld this petition. But what followed was dishonest and troubling, and led to many of the ongoing failures in CNS shunt safety and progress in hydrocephalus care. Yet in 1997, in the two-year interim period it took for FDA to issue a ruling on my petition, I designed & patented a home software method to monitor hydrocephalus (the DiaCeph Test) and address many of these CNS shunt issues. It was a program to run on a custom PDA device. I presented it at the 1999 STAMP Conference in Bethesda, MD. But FDA, and much of the medical industry, scoffed at my efforts. Some of this correspondence is still on my main web site. At that time, few neurosurgeons believed in collecting & sharing medical data on PDAs or over the Internet. I suspect their sentiments are different today. I was also outspoken on the need for progress in hydrocephalus care. And it led to the Hydrocephalus Association, several partnering shunt manufacturers, and their key board neurosurgeons, “blackballing” me of sorts in the field. I was responsible for the 1999 STAMP Conference. But I ceased much of my advocacy after this, and by 2003 had moved on to other interests in the neurosciences. Meanwhile, shunt after shunt after shunt was introduced with problems, including, my current Certas valve which was recalled last year. My 1997 design of the DiaCeph Test would have been one of the earliest mobile apps. Today, it sits on a shelf.
Now when you watch Nancy Frates’ TED talk, you can see her passion, and hear her talk about confronting complacency, and poor colaboration on ALS research. She also instituted an “action plan” right from the start. I also earlier wrote about the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge, and cited the amazing efforts by Christopher Reeve on behalf of spinal cord injury. And there is one very very important element of their respective campaigns: THEY DID NOT COZY UP TO INDUSTRY & COW TOW TO THEIR WHIMS! They told it the way it was, engaged the masses, and industry then followed their lead.
So for those of you who truly want to bring progress to the care & treatment of hydrocephalus, stop cow-towing to industry and be unique and create your own fundraising and awareness campaigns. For me, last year I created the cool site http://www.HydroPowered.org for sharing fun & art on hydrocephalus, and for fundraising when the opportunity presents. Be unique, sincere, passionate, and organized.
Tribute to EMI Records and Godfrey Houndsfield for invention of the CT Scanner
In 2013, I obtained the HydroPowered.orgdomain and created a basic web site for sharing of fun, art, and culture on a technology platform for individuals and families affected by hydrocephalus. The image at top was created from one of my MRI brain scans, with editing from the Pic Say Pro app. I then added a tribute to Godfrey Houndsfield for his engineering vision, and EMI Labs(a division of EMI Records), for funding his project that led to the invention of the CT scanner– arguably the greatest medical invention we have to date.
I do all of this on a shoe-string budget. Still, I feel I could offer those affected by hydrocephalus a new and fun way to connect on art and fun topics.
I acquired the HydroPowered.orgweb site by researching domains that were available with the word “hydro,” short for hydrocephalus, which means water on the brain.
HydroPowered.org Share the Passion for Hydrocephalus
I created the above “blue swirl” image as my first logo from one of my MRI brain scans using the Pic Say Pro mobile app. Then, on my web site and Facebook group, I added additional art with the water or “hydro” theme, including, the Schick Hydro razor. The links below go to my web site and Facebook pages of “hydro” art.
I am hoping to create fun and cool art for hydrocephalus, separate from the disabiling realities of the condition. This came together one evening in May 2013, though my original idea started back at a hydrocephalus conference in the year 2000. Since 2013, I’ve added HydroPowered art and super-hero stories, and am looking to add more stories and characters.
Spiderman Super Hero for Hydrocephalus stories at HydroPowered.org
I want to expand on the “super-hero” theme. I’ve written a few tie-in super hero stories on HydroPowered.org. I actually envision a series of HydroPowered super hero characters. I’ve also created a Facebook Fan Page so other “hydros” (that’s a term we often call each other) can post/share their art and stories.
I continue to brain storm ideas to get this out to the masses without having to spend a lot of money or time. I have made custom T-shirts and polo shirts at Vistaprint online. I’d even be willing to try a “daring PR stunt” if that would bring awareness to this cause.
Drumming workshop for balance and movement challenges in living with hydrocephalus
On Thursday Sept. 24, 2015, I along with HydroPowered.org will feature two drumming workshops for hydrocephalus to address balance, cognition, and movement at the NHF Patient Power conference at the Sheraton Park Hotel in Anaheim, CA. SEE registration info in the flyer. The workshops are free. But there’s a $50 conference fee.
In addition, I am trying to put together a “Drum-off for Hydrocephalus” to help raise awareness and funding for hydrocephalus.
Great pic NHF members affected by hydrtocephalus at a 2015 Orange County fundraiser.
In July 2015, I put together a photo collage with my NFL lookalike, JJ Watt, of the Houston Texans. Check out the similarities below of JJ to my photos at his age.
Photo look-alike collage of Stephen Dolle & JJ Watt of the Houston Texans
I am hoping this look-alike photo collage might create some social network interest in this cause. It was two years ago that I realized JJ & I look alike like. And he seems a lot like me too, with both of us growing up in the Mid-West. So, for Throwback Thursday, I put together this photo collage, and put it on several of the social platforms, hoping to bring attention to hydrocephalus and my efforts with HydroPowered.
Since 1985, I’ve provided quite a bit of outreach & CSR to Orange County area organizations. During the 1980s, my outreach and fundraising efforts were in little baseball, AYSO soccer, the Costa Mesa Chamber of Commerce, Hoag Memorial Hospital, community theatre, and arts in Costa Mesa and Laguna Beach. But since the late 1990s, my focus has shifted to hydrocephalus, and a variety of community causes I’ve undertaken with drumming, or drum circles. I also headed up the drumming Meetup, Orange County Drum Circle.
Stephen Dolle in Washington, D.C. for 1999 STAMP Conference
Since 1995, I’ve been a patient advocate for hydrocephalus, and have been answering patient, medical, CNS shunt, and FDA guidan questions on hydrocephalus. In 2009, I began offering consults in monitoring, since my DiaCeph Test for monitoring never became available. For several years, I was also a board member for the National Hydrocephalus Foundation, and helped with PR and fundraising.
In drum circle facilitation, I own enough instruments to put on drum circles for groups as large as 100 people. And I have facilitated groups as large as 250 drummers. I’ve been organizing and facilitating these drum circles over the last 7-8 years in spite of my own health challenges with hydrocephalus and CNS shunt brain surgeries from a 1992 auto accident, which now total 12 surgeries. But, it hasn’t stopped me from giving back, from being involved in CSR and being a pivitol part of Orange County area outreach. Come Sept. 2015, I’ll be putting on two drum circles at the National Hydrocephalus Foundation conference in Anaheim, CA.
Hydrocephalus Awareness Month 2014Stephen Dolle receives award at Costa Mesa Chamber event.
Back in the 1980s for several years, I served as an independent consultant and helped in sponsorship of a number of area sporting and community events, including, the 1992 Great American Race. 1998 was my first big fundraising endeavor after my injury, where I headed up field sponsorship for the Foothill High School baseball program. Still today, I feel I understand cause marketing, though I always appreciate others’ feedback. If I had not gotten in an auto accident in 1992 and developed hydrocephalus, my plan was to leave health care completely and transition into sports & entertainment agent services.
Drumming for Wellness at the UCI Women’s Wellness Day
There comes a time when even the best of us become recipients of outreach. Since 2012, I’ve been overwhelmed by complications with my hydrocephalus. In March 2015, this led me to I put my own case study and complications up on my blog, knowing all too well I could face scrutiny for it. I felt like I had no choice. I was between a rock and a hard spot, struggling with my health, and struggling to work and take care of myself. You can find it under March 2015 topics.
Pain management and mindfulness in Shunt Revision
I’d like HydroPowered.org to be a different take on hydrocephalus outreach, more about fun, cool, a mix of art, technology, and culture – with a super-hero theme too. I felt the platform might be helpful in fundraisers too much as the 2014 Summer ALS ICE Bucket Challenge that became a mainstream hit.
Since 2013, I have been brain storming and scouring the web for HydroPowered art and photos. It now includes hydropowered racing boats, monster waves, hydropowered damns, the Schick Hydro razor, and basketball. I’m an avid shooter and have even written a special blog on my insights into basketball.
Your Basketball Spirit Guide may help more than you know during Shooting
The plight of hydrocephalus, the stories, the data, and outcomes remain troubling today. It is the leading neurosurgical procedure in children, and affects individuals from in utero to very late in life. CNS shunts, which first came into use as its primary means of treatment in the 1950s, are still standard treatment today. Outcomes are often followed by disability, many numerous shunt malfunctions, and corrective surgeries. The average life of a shunt today is still about 5 years. Several leading programmable shunts in recent years have also been plagued with bizarre programming failures that added to the chaos. In fact, my own shunt implanted less than two years ago, has already been recalled. So hydrocephalus really needs a make-over!
As for famous individuals with hydrocephalus, the Reverand Billy Graham lived with NPH, a form of hydrocephalus, and a shunt for the last 8-10 years of his life. Rock & Roll guitarist, Dick Wagner of Alice Cooper, who passed away this past July, lived with hydrocephalus for several years. And former San Francisco 49ers player, George Visger, developed hydrocephalus after a series of concussions from football.
Incredible Hulk Inspires Kids and others with HydrocephalusAndroid DiaCeph App for Hydrocephalus would improve hydrocephalus care worldwide
As a neuroscientist who provides hydrocephalus monitoring and consults to families in this space, I am adament that CNS shunt technology, and all of its FDA regulations, are in need of an overhaul. We need to change the dynamics and philosophy of the medical field in hydrocephalus care, from “can’t do” to “yes, we will do!” Today, hydrocephalus care & CNS shunt technology remains dominated by a handful of old guard philosophy medical companies and physicians who have resisted the kind of progress we need for many years. Today we need more free-thinkers, more doers! More of an Apple or Google mindset. The same place, same thing, is not producing the kind of advances we need.
I also realize hydrocephalus research is in need of funding, and I believe the HydroPowered platform can play a pivitol role in this going forward. I can compare our plight a bit similar to that of spinal cord injury (SPI) at thetime actor Christopher Reeves became paralyzed. In his case, he almost single-handedly changed the dynamics & funding of SCI. In his brilliant campaign, he initially “called out” the old guard of SCI work that was holding back progress, and then went on to raise money & create progress in SCI treatment that’s not really been seen in any other disorder outside of AIDs.
For several years back in the 1990s, Christopher Reeves had been one of the highest paid speakers in the world, with both political parties vying for him to appear at their conventions. Those were “wow” moments in PR and cause marketing! Today, football players living with SCI, owe vastly improved outcomes to the dynamic efforts of Christopher Reeves.
Below, is my HydroPowered web site & Facebook links. Take a moment to read over it.
Welcome to my NPH and Hydrocephalus Shunt Monitoring Services
My name is Stephen Dolle and I am a neuroscience researcherand medical (shunt) device consultantfor the disorder, hydrocephalus. While my Test Test is yet to be made into a mobile app (few apps for chronic disorders are available today), I provide FREE forms & instructions that patients and families can use. Or, you can pay me to guide you thru the monitoring process, where I can also write up diagnostic reports for your doctors. My fees for this are $125/hour. More information is also available on my web site regarding consulting and monitoring at hydrocephalus treatment & forms. These forms are a great way to keep track of your hydrocephalus history of complaints. Below, I discuss what the monitoring forms and user instructions do, and share some of my patient’s monitoring reports.
The DiaCeph paper methodology could easily be produced as a mobile data app.
I became scientifically involved in CNS shuntsand shunt monitoringin 1994, several years after a brain injury and onset of hydrocephalus. I had performed shuntograms and cisternograms for hydrocephalus as a nuclear medicine technologistfrom 1976-1992 before succumbing to the condition myself. So I was quite familiar with hydrocephalus. But it was two years after my own onset of hydrocephalus with a slew of all too common complications, that I became scientifically involved first as an FDA patient advocate, and eventually, as inventor of the DiaCeph Test– an mHealth app that was to run on a PDA and monitor hydrocephalus as early as 1999.
Knowledge is Power
From 1999-2003, I worked with my start-up company, DiaCeph, Inc., developing the concept and trying to raise funds for development. I continued some FDA patient advocacy thru 2007, but eventually moved on into other interests in the neurosciences, most notably, putting on drumming events and drumming for the brain workshops. I continued to stay abreast of CNS shunt technology. And in 2009, I began providing NPH hydrocephalus shunt monitoring and patient consults. Information about these services can be found via the link below.
Brain Diagram of Ventricles often Enlarged in Hydrocephalus
My drumming workshops became very successful. In Sept. 2015, I put on two drumming workshops and proposed a “Drum-Off for Hydrocephalus” at the National Hydrocephalus Foundation’s PATIENT POWER Conferencein Anaheim, California. Feel free to speak to Debbi Fields as to the success of these drum circles.
Below are my July 2016 updated DiaCeph NPH & hydrocephalus monitoring forms and instructions. They are also pictured below as images. New to this series, is a historical flow chart (2nd below) for retrospectively plotting hydrocephalus complaint levels vs shunt opening pressures for any period from a few months up to 10 or 15 years. The instructions for how to do this are included in the back of my July 2016 DiaCeph NPH Hydrocephalus Monitoring Instructions. You are free to download and use these forms. These are also available on my SlideShare.net – SEE further below. Or, you may download from my web site (once I’ve updated it there) hydrocephalus treatment & forms.This is a good way to keep track of your hydrocephalus history of complaints.
Below are two sample patient reports from hydrocephalus consults I’ve done over the last 7 years. I have permission to host & share these two patient reports so that others affected by hydrocephalus can learn of these new methods in hydrocephalus monitoring.
In the first report, the patient collected 2 weeks of monitoring datavia a journal I provided him, and then returned the completed journal via Fed-Ex. From this data, I created ICP graphs using the Microsoft Excelprogram. And I then interpreted the graphsand wrote up a 15 page reportfor he and his doctors.
In the second report, I reviewed an NPH patient’s CT and MRI brain scansand medical history for signs of shunt malfunction, aging, and brain atrophy. I then wrote up a reportfor the patient, and a second reportfor his physician.
I provide these consults as a medical (shunt) device consultant, mHealth designer, and former imaging consultant. These two reports are as follows:
NPH DiaCeph Monitoring Report #1 on SlideShare.net
Below, are the same (2) DiaCeph Monitoring reportsfrom above, but on my web site as a web page (Report #1), and as PDF files (Reports #1 & #2) for download:
I write about mHealth mobile apps for managing neurological disorders and hydrocephalus. Below is a popular blog on managing migraine with weather apps.
The Elecont HD app provides an hour by hour barometric pressure reading that can be used to help manage migraine headache.
This next blog also contains links to many of the mobile appsI have used or recommend for hydrocephalus and related neurological disorders. You will find the links at the bottom of the blog.
Below is a tandem DiaCeph Test – Single ICP Tap studyI published in 2003, where my DiaCeph Test monitoringI undertook accurately corroborated ICP readingsdone by my neurosurgeon.
Today, kicks off Brain Awareness Week 2013. I selected this image as my favorite for this year’s campaign. I feel the image demonstrates the electrical & energy dialogue both inside our brain, and with the world and environment around us. We are connected, “on-line,” whether we like it or not, even when we’re sleeping and dreaming. So I ask this 2013, what are YOU doing for your brain and the collective consciousness this year? Our BRAIN is the most valuable asset we have. But in 2013, we still invest more dollars in guns & bombs and ways to kill people, than care/defense for our brains. Help me make “peak brain performance” a national priority in 2013.
In 1992, I suffered a brain injury that led to the condition, hydrocephalus, which has required 12 CNS shunt brain surgeries in the 20 years since my accident. During that time, I undertook research in hydrocephalus, neurological devices, assistive technology, music therapy, sensory processing disorders, and today drumming and the brain. In 1997, I designed and patented a AI type of monitoring system for hydrocephalus, that could be produced as a mobile phone app today. Help me make this app possible!
The last several years have been particularly troubling for me with unresolved hydrocephalus and numerous CNS shunt malfunctions & related brain surgeries. And when I’m out around my city and region, as well as watch national & world news on television, I am troubled with the lack of attentiveness to those with injury and impairment of the brain, and the level of commitment of financial resources towards research and ultimately, new treatments in this area. Brain injury and related disorders will effect each of us in our lifetime, either directly, or through an affected family member. The time is NOW to meet this CALL TO ACTION and get the better of brain injury & disorders, instead of the reverse. YOU can help your OWN cause by taking an interest in brain awareness and related research spending.
We are in desperate need of implantable diagnostics in today’s CNS shunt devices. We are in need of a “flow sensor” that would provide continuous readings on CSF flow thru the shunt, and could then be incorporated with patient day to day and clinical data to ultimately know how & whether the shunt is working 24/7. It would provide more timely medical intervention in instances of shunt malfunction, a very common occurrence, dramatically raise quality of life, improve patient outcomes, and pave the way for newer and better shunt devices. Wall Street and medical manufacturers should not have to choose between investing in shunt devices that they make money on today, versus a new implantable sensor that they’d make money on tomorrow!
Help me make brain awareness and scientific investment in brain treatments & technologies a priority in 2013 and beyond, and especially for the disorder hydrocephalus.
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