health gaming

By  Jonah Comstock 05:03 pm June 26, 2017
RightEye, a Bethesda, Maryland-based health technology company that makes a cloud-based eye-tracking technology system and software has announced a new product, a game called Maze Master designed to improve oculomotor control in children with reading disabilities.  “After reading disorders are identified, appropriate interventions and training games are extremely important to enable users to...
By  Jonah Comstock 05:01 pm November 1, 2016
In 2013, Nature told the world that NeuroRacer, the first health game from the research lab that would spin out to become Akili Labs, was a game changer. While Akili Labs cofounder and Chief Science Advisor Adam Gazzaley might quibble with the details, he definitely thinks mental healthcare is a game in need of a change. “Every researcher wants the pun of ‘game change’ used as a headline in...
By  Jonah Comstock 12:16 pm March 8, 2016
Gamification has a perennial presence at health tech conferences, but never seems to take central stage. At a late-day session at HIMSS16, Amanda Havard, Chief Innovation Officer at Health: ELT and Charlie Schroder, a digital strategist and consultant, talked about what’s holding the space back and how health stakeholders can launch gamified apps that work. One topic that frequently comes up in...
By  Jonah Comstock 10:23 am November 11, 2014
Just in time for the start of open enrollment, a Utah health plan has devised a mobile app solution to the problem of convincing so-called "young invincibles" to sign up for health coverage: a gamified app they hope will educate users about the costs of being uninsured. Arches Health Plan is a 27,000-member co-op health plan funded by provisions in the Affordable Care Act. "We were on college...
By  Jonah Comstock 08:19 am September 3, 2014
Sanofi Diabetes, a division of Sanofi-Aventis, has launched a new mobile game for iOS and Android phones in the United Kingdom. The game, called Mission T1D, is meant to be educational, to teach children as well as their parents, caregivers, and friends about Type 1 diabetes. "Children with diabetes and their families face many challenges in their daily lives as they care for a very complex life-...
By  Aditi Pai 10:13 am May 8, 2014
Global revenue for home healthcare devices and services will rise to $12.6 billion in 2018, up from $5.7 billion in 2013, according to a report from IHS Technology. IHS divided the home health market into six segments: independent living services, consumer medical devices, telehealth, personal emergency response systems (PERS), wearable technologies, and health gaming. “Healthcare providers are...
By  Jonah Comstock 08:21 am February 7, 2014
Boston-based LifeGuard Games is gearing up to launch a mobile game to teach children to manage their asthma. Wellapets, which is due to launch at the end of February, follows the mold of recently popular virtual pet games like Club Penguin or Moshi Monsters, but with an extra element of chronic disease management. "I think doctors see there's value to be gained and not a lot of downside in terms...
By  Jonah Comstock 09:00 am September 4, 2013
A study participant playing Neuroracer. A new study from the University of California, San Francisco shows that a specially designed mobile video game could improve neural plasticity in older adults, improving their ability to multitask and to filter out distractions. A spin-off company is currently testing a version of the game for the possible treatment of ADHD, depression, or autism...
By  Jonah Comstock 12:46 pm July 29, 2013
Blue Goji CEO Kai Huang Brothers Charles and Kai Huang, the co-founders of Red Octane and inventors of Guitar Hero, have set their sights on health gaming. AllThingsD is reporting that the pair's new company, Blue Goji, is coming out of stealth mode with a new take on gamified fitness: hardware that turns treadmills, ellipticals, and stationary bikes into fitness-driven arcades. Kai Huang, the...
By  Jonah Comstock 06:39 am January 16, 2013
Konami might not be a familiar name in healthcare, but gamers likely recognize the Japanese company as one of the pioneers of the video game industry that successfully transitioned from jukeboxes to arcade games to home video game systems in the 1980s. And now, in partnership with UnitedHealthcare (a division of UnitedHealth Group), the company is entering the field of public health, offering...