SnowWorld VR Game Reduces Pain For Burn Patients

Bonker writes "The Beeb has news of a simple virtual reality game being used during treatments and rehabilitation for burn patients. Players who engage in a fast-paced snowball fight with penguins and snowmen report feeling less pain. SnowWorld was developed by Professor Hunter Hoffman and Professor David Patterson at the University of Washington Harborview Burn Center in Seattle. Hoffman said, 'Because humans are so visually dominant, wherever you're looking typically that's where your attention is focused. (For patients) during wound care, when they're getting their bandages changed, they're looking at these different tools that the nurses are using to treat them, and just looking at those objects makes them anxious. They begin to associate objects in the room with high pain so you can imagine that day after day they start to develop psychological associations between the treatment room and pain, amplifying how much pain they experience.'"

Comments

Wish my dentist had this...

[Manip]

I REALLY wish my dentist had some kind of distraction... I mean going to the dentists is a really unfun experience generally speaking. I'd love to see TV, or a little game to draw attention from the drilling, poking, pulling, and injections.

Video games have always been great distraction

[AndyAndyAndyAndy]

Example sicknesses, associated with the corresponding distraction:

• Chickenpox, age 11, Sonic 2
• Food poisoning, age 16, GTA III
• Flu, age 18, Metal Gear Solid 2
• Dental surgery, age 21, Freelancer
• Mono, age 22, (Nothing, that was awful)

I mean it's probably not so easy now being an adult, but video games have always been a huge help when it comes to getting over sicknesses. It makes perfect sense for burn victims, especially, to have an immersive type of distraction. We have the ability to, so why not?
Also, I'm not sure why they came up with a brand-new game for this, when they could have just set up Mario 64 and had them race the penguin on loop.