The humble Wii has been a lot of things in its lifespan beyond a simple gaming machine. It's become an alternative exercise centre, dance studio, artist's easel and, of course, a games console. The Wii Remote, meanwhile, has been possibly the most creatively-used game controller in the industry's history, with its motion capabilities giving it a variety of applications. It's now being used as a medical device, showing that Nintendo really can make people feel better.
That's a slight distortion of the truth, but Wii Remotes are being utilised as a tool for diagnosing an eye disorder. Ocular torticollis is an eye disease that causes children to have an abnormal head position, and to diagnose the issue doctors are required to gather data on a child's head movements, which isn't always an easy task. It's been reported in the Investigative Ophthalmology & Visual Science journal that two Wii Remotes can be used to track the movement of the head in real time, sending results to a computer via Bluetooth.
The image in this article shows how the setup works, and is possibly the most elaborate use of Wii Remotes that we've seen so far.
[source newsroomamerica.com]
Comments 21
And this is why the Wii will live on forever.
It's amazing to see such humble tech being used in ways like this and making positive changes to people's lives. You don't see this kind of thing with PS3 or Xbox 360!
@DrCruse
That's pretty cool. I guess there's a lot of potential for Kinect outside of being used for Xbox.
That is just beautiful <3
Interesting... The 3DS hurts eyes, while the Wii helps eyes. But there is the possibility that the 3DS could help your eyes.
O_O Wow. I guess the Wii will live on forever (Or awhile longer at least) but not in the gaming world but in the world of medicine.
You learn a new thing every day. Wow. Whodathunkit? Here's my fun fact for Nintendo: AR in the future will be put on phones and if, say, an elderly(sigh, that again sadly) or someone with medical problems if they have an emergency and dont know where the nearest hospital is they can get out their phone and point it aroud to see the nearest hostital or center where they can get helped.
I can kinda see how this is done, it's because each Wii Mote has an infrared camera inside right?
Beautiful, just beautiful, like Spirit242 said. I have ocular motor apraxia, & when I was diagnosed w/ it, back in the early 90's, I was afraid I was no longer gonna be able to play video games. Believe it, or not, thank God, one of the actual ways to strengthen my eyes was to play video games, according to my eye doctor. Ocular motor apraxia is actually more well-known now, than when I was diagnosed w/ it, years ago.
This is a very cool artcle. In a sidenote: This is why I was originally apprehensive about getting a 3DS.
@Koops3 #6
It doesn't necessarily hurt your eyes. Playing on 3D settings for over 30 min periods is like being to close the the TV. And there's a %1 chance of eye improvement.
Now that's interesting, this will probably inspire some sort of dedicated medical device for this purpose so doctors don't need to use console controls for medicine.
ha, that's really cool!
Wow! Nintendo technology is surprisingly amazing!
A new step in medical and video games!
I got a feeling that government will misuse this new advancement.... or not.
Who knows?
:3 How cool. The Wii stands to live a little longer.
Surprising! This is just as sweet as the use of Wii consoles for physical therapy!
The Wii also helps people with tramatic brain injuries
That's funny, I wonder why they wouldn't use a kinect for something like this. More interesting to me is the fact that this can be done with Wii remotes. I wonder if Nintendo will ever come out with a human tracker based on the Wii remote's camera. I've said before that a kinect with a controller in hand would be ideal and potentially awesome!
This is awesome!
I'm always amazed at the things they come up with that they can use the Wii for =P
First app for the Wii U confirmed.
That's cool. See, Video game technology can help the world. I wanna read mor about this. OW, my eyes hurt! (Grabs Wii Remote and points it towrds eyes) Ah, much better.
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