This post written by work experience participant and special guest Theo - Who had a chance to come and learn about the use of Virtual Reality in rehabilitation.
Healthcare is an extremely important aspect of society and it is also an aspect of society that could be heavily improved with massive benefits. One of the most efficient ways to improve the world of healthcare is the use of Virtual Reality rehabilitation on patients who have suffered injuries such as brain hemorrhages.
VR rehabilitation has tremendous potential to become an important part of healthcare across the world as it can help improve people's coordination and exercise parts of their brain even after serious injuries such as ischemic, hemorrhagic and transient strokes.
When someone suffers an injury such as a brain hemorrhage or a stroke they can lose abilities like their co-ordination and balance, they can also become sensitive to bright lights and colours (which can be easily controlled in virtual reality) and have problems moving their neck, upper body and lower body. An example of this is the story of Sam who was 26 years old when he suffered 4 major brain hemorrhages making him unable to walk or use his upper and lower body but using Add Life Technologies VR rehabilitation he was able to drastically improve his upper body strength and was able to regain some walking ability.
In Doctor Douglas Fahlbusch’s book “Reimagining Healthcare” he identifies the problems in having a disjointed and disconnected healthcare system. He also states in a presentation that 88% of doctors are undergoing excessive stress and that 59% of Medical Doctors said that they would not recommend a career in medicine to children because of the amount of stress. He also says that healthcare patients want more contact information with healthcare and Doctors want less repetitive work.
VR rehabilitation works by getting the patient to do virtual video games or puzzles that exercise their brain. This strengthens their brain to be able to gain some movement back in their body. These games are made to be extremely easy to use as they are designed for people who may only be able to use their eyesight to control it. This means that the games have to be relatively easy to use. Some of the examples of the games and puzzles that are used are picking fruit off a tree and putting them in a basket or rolling doubles with a pair of dice.
Using Virtual Reality Rehabilitation would decrease the money spent by hospitals but would balance out due to the unnecessary need for physical therapy if hospitals used VR Rehabilitation. The costs would drastically go down in the future because VR technology will become increasingly cheaper overtime therefore potentially saving money for hospitals.
Theo Says:
As someone who will grow up with healthcare revolving around technology I think that I am more likely to get a better level of healthcare with higher levels of technology in the future. I think that it’s important that healthcare keeps evolving so we can continue to have the best possible help.
Thank you Theo and good luck with everything
References and Links
1. Fahlbusch, D. "Reimagining Healthcare"
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