1. Serious Games For Dementia Illness Detection and
Motivation, The eMotiva Experience
José Luis Bayo Montón
jobamon@itaca.upv.es

2. Índex
 Introduction
 Objectives
 Materials and Methods
 Results
 Conclusion

3. Introduction
 The aging population is a reality today.
 The increase in elderly generates a greater
number of age-related diseases.
 Dementia is one of these diseases.
o About 5.752.754 cases in Europe.
o 824.000 new cases per year.

4. Introduction
 In Spain dementia affects 550.000 cases.
o 1,24% of the population
 Spain is the fifth in number of cases in Europe.

5. Introduction
 Dementia produces cognitive deterioration.
 Plasticity of the nervous system:
o Ability to create or modify neuronal connections
to compensate for losses.
 A proper stimulation can promote the
plasticity and delayed cognitive deterioration.
 Exercises in attention, orientation, memory,
money management, calculation, reasoning
and social adjustment.

6. Introduction
 eMotiva
 Personal motivation to people with dementia
by detecting behaviour patterns.
 Financed by:

7. Partners
 Experts in the scope of the project:
Scientific society of doctors who carry out their
professional work in nursing homes.
 Technology companies:
Company dedicated to the implementation and
development of new technologies in the health
care sector both nationally and internationally.
Company specialized in decision systems,
information systems and business intelligence.

8. Partners
 Research entities TSB and IBIME belonging to Joint Research
Unit of Biomedical Engineering (UICIB)
Health and Wellbeing Technologies is the R&D&i area of the
ITACA Institute, dedicated to the application of ICT to the
fields of public health, quality of life and social services.
Biomedical Informatics Group is the R&D&i area of the
ITACA Institute, focus on investigation and application
development in medical imaging, biomedical mining and
information engineering.

9. Objectives
 Project aims to create a system for monitoring
and motivation of people with dementia in
institutional residences.
o Tool to detect patterns of behaviour associated
with conduct disorder.
o Therapeutic tool that use personalised
motivation actions, in response to behaviour
disorders and for reduce cognitive deterioration.

10. Objectives
 Personalised motivation actions.
o We adopt the paradigm of serious games.
o The action consists in the realization of an ordered
sequence in time of serious games.
o These games focuses on therapeutic aspects of:
• Cognitive stimulation.
• Physical stimulation and relaxation.

11. Materials and Methods
 Requirements capture:
o Interviews with experts.
• Asociación de Familiares de Alzheimer (AFA)
• Residencia Boni Mediero.
• Centro Residencial San Sebastian.
o Main conclusions of the interviews.
• The use of simple equipment, easy to use.
• Incorporate in the games:
– Visual and auditory stimuli.
– Strengthen memory and daily life activities.
– Configure the game to the capabilities of each patient.
– Fun is the motivation engine.

12. Materials and Methods
 All-in-one PC:
o Natural interaction through a Touch screen
o Compact and nice design to reduce psychological barriers.
 Wiimote Remote Controler:
o Games with physical interaction.
o Detects acceleration in three axes.
o Low cost and extensively tested.
 XNA for immersive games:
o Specific set of tool to develop games.
o High graphics capabilities and performance.
 WPF for non-immersive games:
o Non specific for games.
o Large infrastructure.
o Good graphics capabilities with animation, video and audio capabilities.
o Shorter development time than specific platforms.

13. Results
 Rowing:
o Realistic graphical model to
create an immersive
environment.
o The interaction is based on
move a Wiimote taken as an
oar, in circular movements like
rowing action.
o Patient can move around the
stage following a predefined
path.
o The 3D paradisiacal
environment prometes
relaxation.
o Rowing action stimulates
physical activity.

14. Results
 Follow the sequence:
o Some tiles are shown at the board, in line or in random position, to
change the difficulty.
o Tiles has an order sequence that can be numerical or by size.
o Patient has to click tiles in proper sequence to achieve the goal.
o The interaction is through a touch screen.
o Cognitive stimulation of attention and logic.

15. Results
 Dress the doll:
o The patient see at the screen a figure and different clothing.
o The interaction is through a movement of drag and drop.
o The player has to put clothing into correct place. Depends on difficulty:
• The figure can be a male or female.
• The number of clothing pieces can vary.
• The goal can be:
– Dressing correctly the figure.
– Dressing the figure chosen garments
in the same colour.
– Chosen garments with the same
colour, to dressing the figure.
– Chosen a specific colour garments
fixed by the game, to dressing the
figure.
o Stimulates attention and activities of daily living.

16. Results
 Link sounds with elements:
o In this game the patient has to listen to a sound and select the related
item, choosing between the different displayed on the screen.
o If the correct item is selected the player can hear the next sound.
o When all the sounds are solved, the game ends and congratulates the
patient.
o Stimulates concentration, attention and evokes feelings.

17. Results
 Grouping objects:
o When game starts show different forms distributed randomly across the screen.
o The patient has to find a criterion to form two groups.
o The have to use drag and drop movements to form a group on each side of
screen.
o The criteria may be the shape or colour of the elements.
o The number of items and colours varies to generate different levels of difficulty.
o This game stimulates the capacity of attention, concentration an logic.

18. Conclusions
 We developed a set of serious games to use as
a therapeutic tool.
 The game tries to apply the guidelines to
promote brain plasticity.
 An initial presentation to the medical staff,
they conclude that:
o Games meets the requirements.

19. Conclusions
 Future lines of work:
o Continue with project milestones:
• Install the system
• To carry out a randomized controlled study to test the
concept.
– Subjects with Alzheimer-type dementia, in its later stages.
– 10 weeks of duration.
– 30 play sessions.

20. Thanks for your attention
Serious Games For Dementia Illness Detection and
Motivation, The eMotiva Experience
José Luis Bayo Montón
jobamon@itaca.upv.es