The first-ever virtual reality game that makes treatment less painful for children while adjusting to their anxiety and boredom levels, is being developed at the University of Malta.

The €113,000 cutting-edge technology project aims to reduce pain in children undergoing high-stress hospital procedures. Since pain is reduced, less medication will be needed to treat it.

It has been proven that such technology, which is also used in childbirth and chronic pain treatment, reduces pain by 50% and anxiety by 30%, Head of the Department of Artificial Intelligence Alexiei Dingli said on Friday.

Although the technology for this virtual reality simulator already exists, it has not yet been paired with real-time biological characteristics, Prof. Dingli noted.

The end product of this three-year project will be a headset that children can wear during or after treatment, as they spend hours lying down in bed recovering.

The headset will be paired with a smartwatch that records the users’ heartbeat among others, providing an indication of the child’s anxiety and boredom levels.

This means that the specially designed game will not remove the pain, but it will be intelligent enough to also determine the user’s emotional and physical state and adjust the game accordingly in real time to distract the child from feeling pain.

Photo: Matthew Mirabelli

In what will be a first in the medical field, the project is being funded by Vodafone Malta Foundation, which aims to first roll out the technology among children receiving cancer treatment at the Sir Anthony Mamo Oncology Centre and, subsequently, to all children receiving any form of hospital-based treatment.

Some 100 children will benefit throughout the first year of the project. This will double to 200 in the following year, and to 400 in the third year.

The funding will be made available through the university’s Research Trust, while the research will be led by Prof. Dingli and his team of academics.

The technology will require the involvement of a PhD and Digital Arts MSC student, and it will, eventually, be downloadable free of charge from Google Play and Apple Store.