Um jogo sério de bocha em ambiente de realidade virtual para tratamento não farmacológico de pacientes com doença de Parkinson

Abstract

Parkinson's disease (PD) mainly af ects people over 60 years old, compromising the physical and cognitive capacity of these individuals. In the case of a progressive neurodegenerative disease, with no determined cause and whose current treatments are palliative. However, studies show that treating the symptoms and adopting protocols to delay the progression of the disease can improve the quality of life of patients. Non-pharmacological treatments, through physiotherapy and exercise, can help in the physical and cognitive treatment and social insertion of people with PD. Recently, there has been a great interest in the use of alternative technologies, such as serious games and Virtual Reality (VR), for the rehabilitation and monitoring of PD. However, important elements in the treatment of PD, such as bradykinesia (slowness of movement), muscle stif ness, strength and balance, were not found simultaneously in the studied systems. It is believed that the inclusion of these can bring a great boost to the non-pharmacological treatment of PD. Thus, this work presents an application of serious games in a Virtual Reality (VR) environment to support these elements. Therefore, the serious game of bocce was considered a case study for the treatment of these patients. In addition to collaborating with the rehabilitation work, the serious game proposed here supports the professional responsible for monitoring the patient's evolution. The system was evaluated by professionals specialized in the diagnosis and treatment of patients with PD, through an audiovisual presentation of the application, followed by the application of an evaluation questionnaire, whose compilation and analysis confirmed the relevance and applicability of the proposed game. Therefore, the project contributes to the non- pharmacological treatment of PD, with regard to bradykinesia, stif ness, strength and balance, and postulates the integration of quantitative assessments in serious games in a VR environment as a highly promising approach for the non-pharmacological treatment of PD