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Wii Boosts Parkinson's Treatments
mmmscience writes "Scientists are investigating the use of Wii Sports as a form of treatment for Parkinson's sufferers. After a four-week study, researchers found that rounds of tennis, bowling, and boxing improved rigidity, movement, fine motor skills, and energy levels as well as decreasing the occurrence of depression. It is thought that combining exercise with video games helps to increase levels of dopamine, a chemical that is deficient in Parkinson's. The therapy is gaining notoriety under the name Wii-hab."
No need to make exercise fun. Exercise is like sex, when you're doing it your body is spewing dopamine, endorphins, and bodily fluids in all directions. If you're doing it right, it feels great.
The trick is getting yourself to start exercising in the first place. A sufficiently addictive game would be a good incentive. The best incentive I ever had was a girl in my neighborhood who ran at roughly the same time every day in nothing but skimpy spandex.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
Exercise is like sex, when you're doing it your body is spewing dopamine, endorphins, and bodily fluids in all directions.
You mean I need to be vomiting, cumming and having explosive diarrhea to have sex? No thanks.
We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
It's not just the exercise.
The great thing about today's video games are the reward schedules that make games so damn addictive. These rewards cause dopamine release, which helps offset Parkinson's.
What I wonder is if there's a "Flowers for Algernon" type effect -- like with Levadopa, is tolerance built up quickly? Do patients doing Wii-hab for Parkinson's need to take a "Wii holiday" the same way Parkinson's patients on Levadopa need to take a drug holiday to reset their tolerance?
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
Well in this study, they mention that they see significant improvements in depression symptoms and dopamine levels, which you don't see with normal exercise, and the researchers hypothesize that something about the video game component is causing this. There are actually quite a few studies finding that using the Wii is an incredibly effective form of rehab. One case report: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18689607?ordinalpos=13&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_DefaultReportPanel.Pubmed_RVDocSum
And all of the studies refer to it as a "low-cost gaming console". In comparison to traditional rehab, which cost just as much in equipment then add in the billing rate of a physical or occupational therapist, the Wii is dirt cheap.
I'm a bit weird. The more beautiful I think a girl is, the less inclined I am to talk to her...Not because I'm intimidated, but because I worry that she'll open her mouth and say something moronic, and that'll spoil it.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
You mean I need to be vomiting, cumming and having explosive diarrhea to have sex? No thanks.
I'm sure there's a Japanese word for what you describe, but I'm not about to go look it up.
If libertarians are so opposed to effective government, why don't they all move to Somalia?
Ah yes, "This is bunk" states known Parkinson's expert and physiology sage jshackles.
Before you call it bunk... do you know what causes Parkinson's? Do you know what neurotransmitter abnormality causes Parkinson's symptoms?
Do you know what neurotransmitters are the mediators of the response we know as "feeling of accomplishment"?
Do you know how video games stimulate that response?
Do you know, even discounting the neurotransmitter impact, how exercise via the Wii differs from other "standard" methods of exercise, and how this might specifically be of use to Parkinson's sufferers? Do you know if using a Wii for fine motor control exercise has a higher percentage of participants actually sticking to their rehabilitation schedules than traditional methods?
In short... you call it bunk... but it seems VERY clear to me that (1) you don't know much about the subject and (2) you didn't bother researching it at all before decrying it.
Even if this study was bunk, your refutation of it is even worse... at least they bothered to collect data before making any kind of conclusion.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
So what this article is saying, is that the Wii provides a "watered down" Parkinson's experience.
Dr. Ben Hertz, a director of Occupational Therapy at MCG, explained that "participants showed significant improvements in rigidity, movement, fine motor skills and energy levels. Perhaps most impressively, most participants' depression levels decreased to zero." [MCG] Depression is a major impact factor in Parkinson's, with at least half of the patients reporting the mental illness.
No neurological studies have been done to solidify the reasons behind the improvement. However, Hertz believes that the combination of exercise and video games helps boost dopamine levels, a neurotransmitter that is severely deficient in Parkinson's disease. That is the motivation behind using the Wii over another video game system; Wii requires whole-body movement instead of the simple isolated finger movements on a traditional controller.
While we only have a correlation here and no direct link, I actually think the researchers may be onto something. The reason why this is more than old news is not the physical activity, but the emotional and mental components.
Playing sports for real requires lifting the appropriate equipment, and learning the skill. Wii Sports is simpler, and simply requires basic motions. The remote is also much lighter and easier to handle.
The time invested learning vs the return in enjoyment ramps up faster and if you are a depressed parkinson's patient, being able to easily do a little exercise with a simple little console can emotionally be a big deal. I do not have parkinson's, but I've tried learning tennis and it's a pain in the ass to me, but I enjoy a little wii tennis from time to time with my niece.
And finally, playing a computer game is still novel. Most patients are going to look at something like this and it will be enjoyable. It's not some uber FPS or strategy game where they have to learn 20 combos. They swing a remote and have a little fun with their friends.
The physical activity has always been important, but other consoles don't give you physical interaction, you mash buttons. If you are a parkinson's patient and you can feel like you are doing something, you are not only getting a physical component, but a much needed mental and emotional component.
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
Change you can bewiive in.
No need to make exercise fun. Exercise is like sex, when you're doing it your body is spewing dopamine, endorphins, and bodily fluids in all directions.
I call it: "The Aristocrats!"
than seeing a hot chick, taking in her attractiveness
and then she brings a cigarette to her mouth
instant killjoy
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Isn't it more cost effective to make exercise fun, rather than spend money on Wii and its accessories?
At ~$340 wouldn't a Wii and accessories be cheaper than most dedicated exercise machines? Not to mention probably take up less space when you consider that you can dual purpose the TVs and use the Wiis for other games or just put them away.
In any case, 'making exercise fun' might be more expensive than you think. Sure, a class type workout with an instructor can be interesting and effective, but you have to pay the instructor. That gets expensive quick, even if you have a couple dozen in the class.
Running on a track - boring & painful. Music player of whatever stripe is of limited effectiveness for me.
Running on a treadmill - even more boring.
Running on a treadmill with a TV hooked up - better, especially depending on the program. Still limited.
Using a Wii? Interactive! Real feedback would make it much better. Easier access to exercise tracking can help make sure it remains interesting, tracking stats over time to provide better feedback, etc...
And with Parkinson's, it's likely that they'd need a physical therapist to design a workout - due to varying abilities it might be difficult to place them in a mass class.
I don't read AC A human right