Visual hallucinations, visuo-perceptual function and attention
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Understanding the relationship between visual hallucinations, visuo-perceptual function and attention: a Masters in Research student pilot study
IRAS ID
137871
Contact name
John-Paul Taylor
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
Research summary
In Lewy body diseases (LBD) which include people with Parkinson’s disease and Lewy body dementias, complex, recurrent visual hallucinations (VH) and problems with how one perceives things visually are common and distressing symptoms. However we don’t really understand why visual hallucinations occur.
We do know that certain aspects of visual hallucinations associate with poor vision and how we perceive things. In addition, if one’s concentration or attention is not so good, this increases the likelihood of seeing visual hallucinations.
In this pilot, student-led study, LBD patients with moderate to severe hallucinations will be recruited. They will undergo baseline assessments of their thinking abilities, visual function and visual hallucination severity in their own home and then come to the clinical ageing and research unit (CARU) where they will carry out two specific visual illusion tests including examination of ambiguous visual images as well as staring into a mirror in a semi-darkened room; these are both tests which can elicit visual illusions.
We hypothesise that those patients with a history of more marked hallucinations will have more marked difficulties on visual perception and attention tasks as well as propensity to see more illusions during our illusion tests.
This is a student pilot study and thus is testing the feasibility of these approaches which will help inform what tests might be the best discriminators in people with hallucination which could be applied clinically. We then will be able to develop more advanced studies with larger sample sizes where we might be able to examine brain function with these tests – for example using brain scanning or recording the electrical activity of the brain (also known as encephalography).
REC name
North East - Newcastle & North Tyneside 2 Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
13/NE/0359
Date of REC Opinion
29 Jan 2014
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion