Center on Media and Child Health

In college, I learned about the Center on Media and Child Health at Children's Hospital Boston. Director Dr. Michael Rich worked as a Hollywood filmmaker before becoming a pediatrician and Harvard Medical School professor, and he brings his industry expertise to the field of medicine in innovative ways. He pioneered an intervention technique that allows children with chronic illnesses to create video narratives about their lives. The Video Intervention/Prevention project aims to help others, such as clinicians, understand the daily realities patients face. It also helps ease the transition between pediatric and adult care for kids with diseases such as cystic fibrosis and spina bifida. Check out their website for more information on their different projects!

CMCH, Children's Hospital Boston

Robotic Playmates for Children with Autism

AHN has an interesting article discussing the potential use of therapeutic robots for children with autism. Robots could prove to be an economically sound solution to addressing the needs of people with autism. Though initial research demonstrates that robots can be engaging to children with autism, it remains to be seen how robotic therapy will be generalized to interactions with other human beings.

Hiatus

This blog is on temporary hiatus for a bit as I prepare for the MCAT. However, the world of virtual reality and therapy continues to hurtle forward with exciting new applications, and I would like to direct you to a few reports:

• At the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, post-stroke patients manipulated a robot in virtual environments as part of rehabilitative physical therapy. The virtual reality group walked farther and faster than a group that only used the robot. Read more here.

• GestureTek, a company whose innovations have been utilized for previous virtual reality therapeutic applications, was on display this past weekend at the Consumer Electronics Show. Read more about their new 3-D depth tracking system here.

Virtual Reality Treadmills

One of the major rehabilitation challenges for older stroke victims is re-learning how to walk. A new system, designed by a former chiropractor and current University of Portsmouth Ph.D. student Wendy Powell, aims to change that with an innovative virtual reality system, used in conjunction with a treadmill.

As patients walk on a standard treadmill, moving images projected onto a screen in front of them attempt to trick their brains into thinking that they are walking at a slower rate than they are actually walking. This reduces fear of falling and gradually encourages them to walk faster, increasing endurance and speed. The system is expected to enhance speed, endurance, and strength among stroke victims. Clinical trials are being conducted with a research team from Canada's McGill University.

• University of Portsmouth Front Page News
  

Ditto!

Researchers from Australia have designed a new tool in the quest to bring pain relief to burn victims. The project, lead by Dr. Sam Bucolo, involves a hand-held circular device which engages children as they get their burn dressings changed. Previous work for burn victims has involved goggles, headsets, or other types of immersive virtual reality settings, but this device, Ditto, is designed specifically for small children, aged three to eight. Preliminary data indicate that Ditto can engage children in less than a minute and keep them preoccupied throughout a full bandage replacement, which typically takes around 20 minutes. The results also show that Ditto had more success reducing pain scores during treatment as opposed to traditional distraction tools, such as videos or computer games. Clinical trials are underway, and Ditto is expected to be released for commercial use within the year.

• ScienceAlert Article
  

Virtual Reality Loses A Hero

Dr. Randy Pausch, a talented, generous, and inspiring researcher and educator, passed away on Friday, July 25. The field lost a true hero whose contributions to virtual reality will live on in his imaginative projects, including computer programming teaching tool ALICE. You can read my tribute to him here.

More Information:
PC World
Wall Street Journal (written by Jeffrey Zaslow, co-author of "The Last Lecture," the novel form of Dr. Pausch's lecture)

VR + Students with Special Needs

The journal Topics in Language Disorders has a review by Sue Cobb of projects that utilize virtual reality to teach students with special needs. One of the most promising aspects of VR education is its capacity to teach skills that can be transferred to real-world situations. In the late 90s, researchers from the University of Nottingham and VIRART (Brown, Kerr, and Wilson, 1997) designed and tested virtual ski, driving, home, and supermarket environments. Since then, a variety of others have followed suit, examining the impact of virtual reality settings on everything from social skills to language learning to daily life skills. Cobb summarizes the results; while many studies found that students learned within the setting, and others found evidence that the skills were transferred, the studies have not followed students or interventions for long enough time periods to fully conceive the generalization ability of such programs. The article is a terrific summary of the progress that has been made thus far as well as future areas to examine more.

• Cobb, Sue V.G. Topics in Language Disorders. Virtual Reality: Exploring New Dimensions for Conversation, Language, and Learning. 27(3):211-225, July/September 2007.