WASHINGTON - In Iraq, he treated hundreds of wounded comrades. Not until a sniper targeted him, center the left shoulder. "So when I got home, I could not even do the simplest things - remember Matt Bell, U.S. military doctor -. I could not tie my shoes, put on a belt, buttoning his pants or even put on my hat. " Now, however, Bell can do it all again. By lending and care received at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, where he arrived in May. But, say his doctors, an unexpected ally: a game console, the Nintendo Wii. "At first we were skeptical - said the military review Soldier Major Matt St. Laurent - but then we realized that almost all children who come from Iraq or Afghanistan had played video games in their lives. And that made sense to treat them with a tool familiar to them. "
REHABILITATION - The Wii, then, explains Laurent always the largest, has a number of features that make it perfect for a rehabilitation program. To play, in fact, carry out the movements you want to replicate on the screen: for example, rotate the joystick as a baseball bat or golf in Wii Sports, or move in time and in a coordinated fingers, if you're playing Guitar Hero (a video game where you have to play an imaginary guitar): the ideal, if you have to reactivate unused limbs after injury. "In fact, these games" cheat "the mind - continues Dr. Hector Romero -. If there is a wound, we all tend to stop the movement when we begin to feel pain. But if we're playing, the merger means that to overcome the fears, and complete the movement. This helps to regain mobility and dexterity in the arts. " "My doctor had put a weight around your wrist - Bell confirmed the soldier - and it hurt me at first. But when I started playing, I completely forgot that that weight was there. I had fun, and I was concentrating on the game, that's all. "
INVISIBLE WOUNDS - The point is that the "Wii-habilitation '(a pun from the original rehabilitation) not only helps external wounds, but also invisible. That, according to studies of the American army, afflicting 20% \u200b\u200bof veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (where they Milt, since 2001, 1.7 million soldiers and 30 thousand of them were injured). "When soldiers return from war zones, often with incredible wounds, they ask, "How am I going to get back on track?". But when they start to play, they realize they are doing exactly what they were doing before you leave. " In the face of a game, the military resume talking. And a challenge: "Often we play a newcomer with a soldier who is at the center of attention the longest. So the "rookie" who sees with his own wounds, you can play great. And he has a reason to work hard to rehabilitation, to return to normal after the hell. " From
Courier
0 comments:
Post a Comment