Video Game Helps Rehabilitate Cognitive Impairment

A novel training platform assists in the rehabilitation of patients suffering from cognitive impairment using adaptive, interactive video games.

The Intendu Functional Brain Trainer is designed specifically for adaptive and personalized training of people suffering from cognitive impairment resulting from traumatic brain injury (TBI), stroke, mental disease, neurodegenerative disease, and other brain dysfunctions. Users play engaging and cognitively challenging video games where they need to physically interact within real-life scenarios. Cognitive challenges are automatically adjusted to the patients' capabilities and rehabilitation needs, optimally stimulating their brain in real-time.

The Functional Brain Trainer can be used to train cognitive functions such as multitasking, memory, self-initiation, inhibition, and attention. Key aspects of the training platform include full body interaction to enhance brain plasticity processes; a neurocognitive engine that automatically adapts the games to patients' capabilities and needs; and dynamic and realistic environments that provide motivating rewards and a scoring system to ensure ongoing motivation for continuous training, as well as patient compliance.

The platform is grounded on neuroplasticity principles, evidence-based paradigms, and research that demonstrate that patients improve during training and that their performance is correlated with standard cognitive assessments. People with brain dysfunctions can access the platform immediately following injury in rehabilitation hospitals, continue in rehabilitation clinics, and later on in their own homes, providing continuity of care with constant tracking of performance and detailed progress reports. The Intendu Functional Brain Trainer is a product of Intendu (Herzliya, Israel).

“Therapists have limited training tools that engage the patients in daily living scenarios, and lack tools that can adapt to patients' needs and capabilities in real time,” said Son Preminger, PhD, MBA, MSc, CEO, and founder of Intendu. “The brain rehabilitation community faces a significant challenge in providing proper tools for patients to continue their cognitive rehabilitation after they have completed rehabilitation treatment. The Functional Brain Trainer seeks to provide that tool set.”

“The adaptive nature of the games allows patients of various levels to be engaged and challenged by the software,” said Dalise Robinson, MA-CCC/SLP, speech and language clinical manager at the Shepherd Pathways Center (Atlanta, GA, USA). “The body motion component makes the game experience more realistic and patients like it. We are currently using the Functional Brain Trainer and the feedback of both therapists and patients is very positive. We see also a great potential for the product in the home environment.”

Related Links:
Intendu
Shepherd Pathways Center