Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) is a leading source of morbidity in U.S. soldiers in Iraq. Each year 1.5 million Americans sustain a TBI and there are 5.3 million people with a permanent TBI-related disability in the U.S. Videogames have been shown to increase TBI patient cognitive ability, memory and recall.. The purpose of this proposal is to meld clinical strategies used in treating TBI patients with intrinsically motivating video games. A computerized intervention that incorporates both state-of-the-art gaming technology and state-of-the-art cognitive and motor rehabilitation strategies has the potential to be efficacious, cost-effective, and highly-motivating for a generation of patients who are habitual users of computerized games as a source of entertainment. This Phase I study will develop one game to demonstrate the process of incorporating clinical and entertainment requirements into a video game. The work plan will involve intense iterative interaction between TBI treatment clinicians and professional game designers. This collaboration will utilize the latest software development tools to define detail game design requirements and will use a storyboard process to generate a game scenario. Extensive testing will verify the functionality of the program and a clinical validation plan will be designed.
Keywords: Game-Based Training, Traumatic Brain Injury, Psychological Helth, Behavioral Health
