Summary
A small study conducted at Hampton University found that stroke survivors may be able to regain some ability through the use of virtual reality video games. Sung H. You, lead author of the study, used commercially-sold interactive video games in the study, in which life-size versions of the patient were superimposed onto a video screen. You says that after the virtual reality therapy, the damaged side of patients' brains were activated. In tests in which the participants walked or climbed stairs, the patients who received the VR therapy had 23 percent and 17 percent improvements over the patients who did not receive the therapy. You hopes to expand the study soon, since the original experiments only included 10 patients.
Original source:
http://www.forbes.com/lifestyle/health/feeds/hscout/2005/05/12/hscout525691.html
Details
Virtual reality games improved the ability of stroke survivors to walk and also appear to have improved function in the damaged part of the brain, researchers report.
It was a small study, including just 10 people who had suffered strokes more than a year earlier.
But the findings indicate that computerized game-playing could have a role in stroke rehabilitation programs, said lead study author Sung H. You, assistant professor of physical therapy at Hampton University, in Hampton, Va.
The findings are published in the May 13 rapid access issue of the journal Stroke.
These games create a virtual reality scene and superimpose the patient's life-size body into the scene.
"If a patient likes soccer, we use a soccer game.
They stand in front of a big-screen television set, and a camera captures their motion.
Five of them received the computer-assisted training one hour a day, five days a week for a month, while the others did not.
"We hope to work on a larger scale, perhaps in patients' homes," You said.
The new study offers more proof that computerized training can help stroke patients recover function, said Grigore C. Burdea, professor of computer engineering and director of the Human-Machines Interface Laboratory at Rutgers University, who has done similar work.
"Our laboratory developed prototype devices rather than using a commercial system," Burdea said.
Working with physicians at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, Burdea's group first added virtual reality training to conventional
stroke rehabilitation therapy in 2002.
"There is hope for recovery, even though under current medical arrangements therapy stops a few months after a stroke.
Similar results have been reported in small-scale trials at several institutions, Burdea said.
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Wednesday, May 25, 2005
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