Are elderly sufferers of dementia able to play a reminiscence game on a tablet device independently?
Master thesis
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Date
2011Metadata
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- Institutt for design [1047]
Abstract
As the old population is growing older, a huge need for increased health care is
needed, and the time per patient may be decreased in the future because of an
increased carer burden. Many of the elderly develop some sort of dementia when
growing older. In Norway 70 000 people already suffers from this syndrome.
However, reminiscence is considered the process of thinking or telling others about
one’s past experiences, and may probably delay the aggravation of these peoples’
cognitive function and dementia symptoms. In this thesis a mobile reminiscence game
was developed using a strong user centered design process with five patients suffering
from dementia and an expert mini-focus group. The intention was to make the game
assist the patients while playing questions from the past, by giving automated
instructions and feedback to the user while playing. Several usability issues regarded
with the reminiscence game were revealed during this process, to suit the patients’
different physical and mental skills.
An observational study was conducted in the end to observe a selected group of
patients’ suffering from dementia ability to play the game independently. This study
found 21 of 40 given questions (52,5%) to be answered totally independent by the
users. The results found the users to play more independently as they progressed in
the game. The results also discovered individual differences among the users, in terms
of playing independently.