Medical

This Vancouver Sun article reports that "A virtual walk in the park may be just what the doctor ordered for chronic pain sufferers. Simon Fraser University associate professor Diane Gromala claims research shows a 3-D stroll in the forest has the power to help people manage chronic pain, sometimes with better results than traditional means such as morphine.

Gromala, head of SFU's Transforming Pain Research Group, is developing a virtual reality technique called "walking meditation." The technique is one of several programs used around the world to aid sufferers of chronic back pain and migraines.

From the Positive Technology Journal website: "The sensitivity of a virtual reality task to planning and prospective memory impairments: Group differences and the efficacy of periodic alerts on performance."

Neuropsychol Rehabil. 2009 Aug 26;:1-25

"Executive functions have been argued to be the most vulnerable to brain injury. In providing an analogue of everyday situations amenable to control and management virtual reality (VR) may offer better insights into planning deficits consequent upon brain injury.

This Virtalis Press Release is in the form of a case study about the use of a pioneering use of VR for radiotherapy training at Birmingham City University. "2008 saw the national roll out by the Department of Health of a revolutionary approach to radiotherapy training. Called VERT, and drawing on Virtual Reality (VR) technology from Virtalis, it has been successfully installed in 10 universities and dozens of cancer centres all over England. Birmingham City University was a development partner on VERT and one of the first to have the system installed and is now putting the System to far more varied uses than it originally anticipated.

From this Wired Science article: " New pilots train on flight simulators before flying their first 757. Scientists experiment on animals before giving their new drug to patients. And fledgling surgeons perform their first few operations on… real people.

Now, a small but growing group of doctors are trying to make surgical training safer by bringing virtual reality into the operating room, and taking the trial-by-error out.

This Press Release talks about the use of VR in a new research initiative at De Montfort University.

"IN RECENT years, significant resources and research activities worldwide have been invested in the creation of Virtual Reality (VR) environments to train specialised skills for surgeons. Virtalis was one of the first, creating a trainer for minimally invasive therapy. Now, a research team from De Montfort University has begun work on assessing the feasibility for a whole team VR surgical trainer with Virtalis both supplying and designing the VR research platform.

This Science Daily article reports the Nintendo Wii may enhance Parkinson's treatment. From the article: "The Nintendo Wii may help treat symptoms of Parkinson's disease, including depression, a Medical College of Georgia researcher says.

Parkinson’s disease is a degenerative disease that impairs motor skills. Dr. Herz theorized that the popular computer game console, which simulates various sports and activities, could improve coordination, reflexes and other movement-related skills, but he found additional benefits as well.

From Positive Technology Journal: "Virtual reality in acquired brain injury upper limb rehabilitation: evidence-based evaluation of clinical research.

Brain Inj 2009 Mar; 23(3):179-91.

Authors: Mumford N, Wilson PH

This BBC News Channel article talks about biomedical models simulating the human body both structurally and functionally. From the article: "Dr Peter Kohl has a big idea for the future of heart surgery. A patient needing an immediate operation will have a scan and in the 45 minutes it takes for blood test results to come back, surgeons will have simulated alternative operations using computer models, and know the best way to proceed. They will have investigated different surgical scenarios in virtual reality and will understand the effects these have on the individual's heart.

This stuff.co.nz article talks about a project designing virtual work environments to give students practical experience. From the article: "Students will be able to peek inside chemical reactions and explore three-dimensional models of ear canals in virtual technology being developed at Canterbury University.

The university has received $1.77 million from the Government's Encouraging and Supporting Innovation Fund for a three-year project designing virtual work environments to give students practical experience.

Canterbury University HitLab director Mark Billinghurst, who is leading the project, said New Zealand is lagging behind in virtual technology.

"There's not much government investment in the area, so this will allow us to catch up with some of the teaching and technology trends internationally."

This NewScientist article takes a look at a research on the brain's perception of the physical self. From the article: "Ever wanted Arnie's abs or the legs of Julia Roberts? Maybe you'll get the chance to make believe they are your own in future, now that the illusion of "body-swapping" has been successfully created in the lab.

Spooky as it sounds, neuroscientists at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, were able to use simple camera trickery to fool volunteers into perceiving the bodies of both mannequins and other people as their own.