Healing Sick Children with VR Games #WhatWeCanDoForTheFuture

VR (Virtual Reality) games becoming a medical treatment.
Have you ever heard of such a thing?

You might think that's ridiculous.
However, VR games are already being used for actual medical treatment around the world.

Treating autism, panic disorders, and ADHD.
The focus is primarily on children's mental health treatment.
This is because a great deal of VR research is being conducted worldwide, and it has been found that such VR treatment effects are particularly high for children.
In the United States, we are reaching an era where doctors are already prescribing VR games.

Unfortunately, such initiatives are lagging behind in Japan.
Even though much of the technology required to produce VR goggles originated in Japan.
I want to leverage Japan's unique strengths to create world-class VR therapeutic games that help treat children.

As a surgeon, I treat children with pediatric cancer every day.
Pediatric cancer is relatively rare, affecting one in 10,000 children, but across Japan, about 2,000 children are newly diagnosed with cancer every year.
Although it is not widely known, the treatment for pediatric cancer is actually much more intense (heavier) than the treatment for adult cancer.
I want to create VR games that will benefit such children.

The VR experience is very realistic because it surrounds you 360 degrees.
That is precisely why it is so effective for children.
Together with unique Japanese characters, they learn about their own bodies and cancer.
Then, with the help of anticancer drugs (and other treatments), they defeat the cancer that is attacking them.
By having such an experience, children's motivation for treatment increases, and side effects are reduced.
And as a result, the treatment progresses successfully.
…perhaps.

Aiming for such a "future"
I am promoting a VR game project for children with pediatric cancer.

Initiatives to utilize VR for treatment are, of course, not limited to pediatric cancer.
There are many areas where VR treatment can be applied, including adult cancer and various other pediatric treatment fields.
In the future, it will likely expand into various fields.
But for that to happen, someone has to take a step forward now.

We cannot allow the "drug lag," where global medical treatments are difficult to use in Japan, to extend into the field of VR.
With that thought in mind, I am racing through the present for the sake of the children of the future.