On 14, 15, 16 September 2018 the St. Mauritius Therapieklinik (Meerbusch, Germany) hosted the VR4REHAB Hackathon, a 2.5-days workshop which gathered together entrepreneurs, patients, rehabilitation personnel as well as technical specialists to find out new ideas concerning rehabilitation with virtual and augmented reality.
The event, organized in collaboration with the St. Mauritius Therapieklinik, RWTH Aachen University and Uniklinik RWTH Aachen University for the project VR4REHAB, was a tremendous success and it ended with the victory of the “Crystal Ball” team, which developed a concept for an augmented reality game for cognitive rehabilitation.
In fact, the German Hackathon was aimed on improving cognitive function and behavior in patients with brain damage. During the first day, Friday 14 September, six clinical cases have been introduced and the participants had the possibility to choose the topic they wanted to work on.
During the workshop, the groups had the opportunity to take part in some “inspiration session” and to attend the pitches given by four keynote speakers: Prof. Dr. Gernot Heisenberg (Institut für Informationswissenschaft - TH Köln), Prof. Dr. Betty Mohler (Institut für Sportwissenschaft - TU Darmstadt), Victor Haze (Innovation Manager - Health Valley NL) and René Luigies (Games Solution Lab).
For two days, the teams worked together sharing their expertise and ideas in order to develop new solutions for cognitive and behavioral problems in children and young adults with brain lesions. Each team designed a concept for rehabilitation with Virtual Reality tools and presented it to the jury on the last day of the Hackathon.
Members of the jury were: Kerstin Konrad (Uniklinik- RWTH Aachen University), Helga Lüngen (ZNS Hannelore-Kohl-Stiftung), Nicole von Steinbüchel-Rheinwall (Georg-August-Universität Göttingen), PD Dr. med. Christian Dohle (Rehabilitation Median-Klinik Berlin-Kladow), Rüdiger Goll (International M&A GmbH), Dr. phil. Bruno Fimm (RWTH Aachen University).
On the last day, Sunday 16th September, the Hackathon Jury awarded the team “Crystal Ball” as winner of the German Hackathon. They proposed a concept for an augmented reality game to be used in cognitive rehabilitation. In the next stage of the VR4REHAB project, the Game Jams, this idea will be developed in a prototype and studied in Rehab setting.
Moreover, the “Crystal Ball” group won a journey to the project partner Lille University, where they will have the possibility to visit the Virtual Reality Lab with an Open Reality Experience (TORE) facility: a leading-edge virtual reality equipment enabling an immersive experience of 3D virtual environments.
Join the next VR4REHAB Hackathon in Bruges: 25, 26, 27 October 2018
