video games as therapy for Alzheimer’s

The Madrid startup Golden Gamers defended this week that its project developed to use video games in the treatment of elderly people with Alzheimer’s and other cognitive impairments had achieved “improvements in short-term memory” in his first tests. According to its CEO, Gloria Sánchez, from the ‘Investor and Demo Day’ organized by Madrid in Game, the results come after 120 sessions in three day centers in the capital, where they were also observed clinical improvements such as greater stability and balance. The intention of this emerging company is bring your methodology to health professionals and families“training them to apply it” and improve its effectiveness.

Specifically, its pilot project ‘Golden Gamers Go’ aims to divide video games according to the objective you want to achieveadvised by an Artificial Intelligence agent. “In a few seconds you will have a list of video games already on the market to apply with the elderly. Ordered according to the degree of most affinity with your needs. In each file are the keys to using our methodology,” defended the CEO. Sánchez then qualified his project as a “social revolution” for which they still need close to 350,000 euros, which they would use to finance the development of the platform, marketing campaigns and the expansion of the team.

Video games generate positive energy that makes them remember

The project director, who is also an occupational therapist, confirmed in subsequent statements to Europa Press that the improvements detected in recent memory do not occur “with other traditional therapy”. As he explained, What takes a person with Alzheimer’s or dementia type diseases the longest to forget is what “has made them immensely happy”. “Older people come home and maybe they don’t know how to say what they had for breakfast, what they ate or what activity they did, but They know how to tell that they have played video gamesand what video game they have played and what it is about. AND It is because of all the positive emotion that it generates in them.“, he defended.

Another notable characteristic of this project is that, beyond the stimuli, participants have become able to remember what they played the previous day and even where they left off.

“I didn’t know how to play this”

In some cases, the games reach such complexity that they cannot be carried out by just one of these majors.. In that case, and thanks to the characteristics of the classic control, the functions are divided with the help of one of the therapists. For example, one of the caregivers can operate the camera in this system designed to divide the gameplay. In other cases, The older person can handle the direction and another companion can handle the blows. in combat versions. “We got that the older person has to focus on a single function and a single command. That makes it much easier for him to be able to play and enjoy it,” Sánchez said.

In this context, the ‘Investor and Demo Day’ served the entity to show your project to potential investors that could offer the resources necessary to realize the potential ideas of their creators. Antonia Fernández and Lola Marique participated in this exhibition, two women who are over 80 years old and who were, like professional players, fighting controller in hand in a virtual battle.

“I didn’t know how to play this. But Last year they brought me and I was fighting with myself and I like it“Lola told this agency, who admitted that she has “a lot of fun with this.” For both of them it was about something they had never “seen”, but they don’t care that they haven’t discovered it until now. “It makes them happy” at their age.