UNC Trauma Program:
Patient Education and Injury Prevention
through Serious Games
Project Proposal
Help to Revolutionize Patient Education- Really!!
Critical discharge teaching, especially in busy emergency settings are often hurriedly
delivered to usually to patients who are medicated and exhausted families. The
instructions, usually provided in hardcopy with single color text, no pictures, and difficult to
comprehend for those with lower levels of health literacy unsurprisingly end up on the floor
board of the car never read by the patient or family.
Compliance with discharge instructions have been gaining greater attention due to
disincentives by CMS against hospital readmissions and suboptimal patient outcomes.
Despite these clear deficiencies, there has been no wide-spread changes in the
way discharge information is delivered.
This project calls for the development of an i-pad or tablet-compatible application capable of
displaying discharge instructions as text, multi-media, and simple flash games to improve
comprehension, retention, compliance and overall improved patient outcomes.
Additionally, the application can provide high-quality and easily tailored education bundles
that can be delivered more consistently across entire hospital systems or trauma regions.
Though this application cannot replace effective teaching from nurses and physicians, it can
improve understanding, efficiency, compliance, and overall quality of patient teaching.
Examples of Serious Games
Serious Games to Prevent Serious Injuries
Build upon work from last semester to
achieve the following:
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•
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Use of interactive gaming technology to
teach pediatrics and adults
Exportable / accessible on mobile devices
Future applications:
o Link to personal health portal which
tracks performance on games and
other interactive programs
o Links to translator services capable
of video chat and transcription of
written instructions