Presented at the International Symposium on Human Factors and Ergonomics in Health Care: Shaping the Future, San Diego, CA (April 2016)

Soldiers who suffer a potentially concussive injury or barotrauma need accurate, timely, in-theater assessment of symptoms. Often this initial assessment and diagnosis must be conducted by first-level responders who attempt to assess vestibular symptoms directly following a concussive event; however, these symptoms are often missed or misdiagnosed due to a lack of familiarity with the subtleties of impaired vestibular function, and the improper presentation of assessments. To address this challenge, we present a prototype system for the Assessment and Diagnosis of Vestibular Indicators of Soldier Operational Readiness (ADVISOR). ADVISOR is designed with human factors principles in mind, providing an effective means to guide non-expert personnel through vestibular function assessments they may not be overly familiar with. Additionally ADVISOR is a multi-user system, which involves the patient in their own assessments, constantly informing them on the proper assessment techniques through intelligent alerting and attention direction. Utilizing its hardware suite, ADVISOR is able to use objective data gathering techniques to ensure patients comply with the nuances of each assessment, and that medical assessors are conducting the tests properly.