Games for Health: Recap November 9, 2011
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Conference, Game, Health 2.0, Innovation, Medicine, Medicine 2.0, Virtuality, Web 2.0.3 comments
A few weeks ago, I was a keynote speaker at the Games for Health conference in Amsterdam. I talked about social games, crowdsourcing in medicine and science and also about the importance of including health gaming in medical education. I have to say I had a great time there, saw many promising innovations and as a lover of video games, I tried many projects and gadgets myself.
Projects and ideas I came across there:
Figurerunning: draw figures on the map when running by using their smartphone application.
Use your bike and run or walk around in the virtual world.
Medsim: a birth simulation.
I’m pretty sure I’ll be at Games for Health 2012 as well! See you there!
A virtual cardiology consultation on World Heart Day! October 25, 2011
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Video, Virtuality, Web 2.0, Webicina.add a comment
A few weeks ago, I talked about how the first Hungarian virtual cardiology consultation would be organized by Webicina.com and finally it turned out to be a really successful event. We hope to organize even more similar events in many topics!
On the 29th of September, between 16:00 and 18:00 Central European Time, two cardiologists answered the questions of patients in the virtual world of Visuland.com. They were able to enter the virtual realm through this link. Basically we wanted to give readers and patients a chance to ask questions, meet specialists, meet fellow patients in a 3D environment that is very easy to handle.
A virtual consultation on World Heart Day! September 27, 2011
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Web 2.0, Medicine 2.0, Health 2.0, Video, Virtuality, Visuland.2 comments
As I mentioned before, I manage the social media presence of the biggest and most popular Hungarian Health portal, HáziPatika.com, and we have been working hard on a project that is just about to launch. On the 29th of September, between 16:00 and 18:00 Central European Time, two cardiologists will answer the questions of patients in the virtual world of Visuland.com. They will be able to enter the virtual realm through this link. Basically we wanted to give readers and patients a chance to ask questions, meet specialists, meet fellow patients in a 3D environment that is very easy to handle. It might create a brand new feeling of belonging to a community where you can do everything except a real handshake. I hope they will like it!
A video about Visuland.com:
A video about how you can enter the virtual world:
I will certainly write here about the experience and the whole event. Stay tuned for more!
Organizing virtual medical events: Interview July 15, 2011
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Interview, Medical education, Medicine, Medicine 2.0, Second Life, Virtuality, Web 2.0.add a comment
I did an interview with a medical professional (virtual name is Vera Zhaoying) who has been organizing medical events for years in Second Life.
- When and why did you start organizing medical events in Second Life?
That is I think 4,5 years ago that I spoke for AMMC (the Ann Myers Medical Center), I was still a student and in real life I was not happy to talk in public. During that time Ann (founder of the AMMC) still taught in AMMC. When I proposed a subject, Ann said OK and you go do it yourself. Looked it up on the website. That was the 10th of September, 2007 and the topic was spinal cord injuries. I think during 2008 I began to organize meetings on a regular bases and created the AMMC intern group. By that time Dr Ann began to have more serious health problems and had asked me to do this, and i did 
- What do you do in real life and do your colleagues know about your online activities?
What I do in real life, actually I think it is better to say what my roles are. First I am me and that can be tricky enough (joking) and have been an MD sinch March 2010 MD (proud proud proud). Now I’m a resident of Internal medicine and due to a trial already also in Oncology.
My online activities, some do know it and are interested and see the potentials, some think it is just a game and I should not waste my time on it. Surprisingly enough the more enthousiast collegues are those a bit older/old. I had not expected that, the younger ones are way more familiar with new technology and applications and mostly they don’t see it as a possible addition.
- What about the Ann Myers Medical Center? Are there any live events these days?
Sadly currently not, AMMC does not have land and believe me I did try to find it, so I hope I win state lottery soon and simply buy a SIM
What is now under development is a mobile solution, I asked a builder to create a truck and trailer. The trailer is the key part, it has a double that swings open in an angle of 90 degrees showing the interior. The first trailer will be about breast awareness. I wait with other plans till this one is completed.
I'm attending a simulation at the Ann Myers Medical Center
- What are your plans for the near future?
Well actually I miss a house in Second Life to call home and have a small office in it. So I probably go rent one. Other plans are 3 extra trailers for several topics: Diabetes is one and for the more near future a ship. That might sound funny but I don’t see AMMC getting land anytime soon, in order not to lose the momentum, I thought of the ship, it must have a place for meetings but also instead of trailers have containers with the option I just described, the containers can be used in for instance mobile hospital. Bit like medicine sans frontiere, I have to plan that in more details.
Many thanks for the answers and I wish you luck with your virtual medical education projects!
Kinect for CPR training: Video July 13, 2011
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Medical education, Medicine, Medicine 2.0, Video, Virtuality.2 comments
Federico Semeraro sent me this description about his project:
The main objective of this research project is the development of a training platform for quality cardiopulmonary resuscitation of lay and health care personnel. The proposed training platform is composed of a traditional manikin for the physical interaction and Kinect Sensor, that will beautomatically reconstruct trainee’s hands position and posture while performing chest compressions.
The system will automatically extract and analyse the movement features performed by the trainee, to assess the trainee performance in terms of compression rate and depth and the correct arms‘ position and alignment with the mannequin. An on-line feedback correction will be provided during the performance. The training session will be also endowed with an augmented reality simulation, showing the current view from the camera enriched with superimposed graphical information to improve the compression performance (arrow, text, bars) and the 3D graphics representation of the mannequin as a virtual character, allowing the detection of chest rising and correct standard position during inflation for checking the proper application of ventilation.
Internet in Medicine University Course: Virtual Reality in Medicine November 11, 2010
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Health 2.0, Medicine, Medicine 2.0, Medicine 2.0 Course, Second Life, Slideshow, Video, Virtuality, Web 2.0.6 comments
The 6th week of the world’s first university accredited course focusing on medicine and social media was dedicated to virtual reality in medicine.
First slideshow:
- Definition of virtual worlds
- Why do we need a second life?
- community + online games + simulation
- One example is secondlife.com
A shorter version of the original slideshow with my own narration:
- More than 20 million users, 30,000,000 online hours
- What does SL mean for people?
- It used to mean gambling (but not now)
- Game? work? (The number of Second Life residents generating more than $5,000 in monthly income has more than quadrupled to 116 in the past year, according to San Francisco’s Linden Lab, owner of Second Life.); place?; tool?; entertainment?; sport?; opportunity?; appearance?
- Technological barriers: register, download, install, open, log in
- You can fly, walk, teleport, buy, sell, build.
- Communication (chat, IM, e-mail, voice)
- advantages (3D, media content, fast communication – SL fitness)
- disadvantages (reliability, serious hardware requirement)
- why do we need a SL?
Take-home message: great opportunities for patients and medical professionals as well.
Second slideshow:
- How do medical students and physicians use it?
- AMMC
- Imperial College of London
- NHS London
- Scifoo Lives On
- Genome Island and many more
- Patients?
- Healthinfo Island
- Virtual Ability
- SLStroke and many more
- Where to follow health events?
Take-home message: Second Life provides useful tools to organize meetings, educate and learn without borders.
Free e-guide about medicine and virtual worlds on Webicina.
Real-looking Android: Actroid-F November 4, 2010
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Video, Virtuality.4 comments
It’s truly unbelievable, we are not far from having Android nurses in hospitals.
Arachnophobia Clinic in 3D August 25, 2010
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in Medicine, Video, Virtuality, Web 2.0.add a comment
Last year, I attended the Medicine Meets Virtual Reality conference in Long Beach, CA and also managed a blog for them where we could post interviews and interesting photos. There I came across many great applications that might help people dealing with different phobias through virtual reality systems. Here are some examples, an interview about how VR helps drug addicts or the treatment of post-traumatic stress disorders. Now Medgadget shared an initiative focusing on arachnophobia therapy in 3D:
British satellite television company Sky, as part of its 3D TV marketing campaign, will be hosting an “Arachnophobia Clinic” at the Bugworld Experience in Liverpool. The company will basically be showing a 3D movie about spiders, which means if you’re not a patient suffering from this debilitating disease you’ll probably have a jolly good time.
The Future of Medical Imaging August 2, 2010
Posted by Dr. Bertalan Meskó in eHealth, Health, Innovation, Invention, Medicine, Medicine 2.0, Video, Virtuality, Visualization.1 comment so far
Have you every wondered what happens if you combine a 3D TV with virtual reality in medical imaging? Well, the device described in the video was developed by the University of California, San Diego and costs around $10,000. CoolestGadgets commented on this:
HUVR “couples a consumer 3D HDTV panel with a half-silvered mirror to project any graphic image onto the user’s hands and/or into the space surrounding them”. Apparently, the user’s head is tracked in order to get the correct perspective, and there is a haptic feedback device on hand for manipulation. I noticed that their haptic device looks a lot like a Novint Falcon, which I believe was designed for 3D gaming.
And as a second step, if you think it will lead to even more complicated interfaces, well, see what Hitachi developed, a gesture-based interface:
