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Going through medical procedures can be difficult, especially for children. Distraction therapy helps child patients cope with pain during medical treatments.

Besides being incredibly immersive, virtual reality games could potentially provide a new type of distraction therapy. Researchers from the University of Malta are combining the powers of artificial intelligence and virtual reality to create a VR game to help child patients during medical procedures. 

The MORPHEUS project is led by Prof Alexiei Dingli and Luca Bondin from the Department of Artificial Intelligence at the University of Malta; in collaboration with Fabrizio Cali as lead designer, and supervised by Prof. Vince Briffa from the Faculty of Media and Knowledge Science.

The game illustrates an island populated by animals and allows players to engage and focus on the colourful and magical landscape. The players’ physiological data is monitored in real time and artificial intelligence is used to detect heart rate and other physiological signals to infer a patients’ state and adjust the game accordingly. For example, if it notices that the player is not engaged enough, the game will introduce entertaining challenges.

MORPHEUS is a project of The University of Malta funded by Epic For Good Foundation. The game will be rolled out for child cancer patients at the Sir Anthony Mamo Oncology Centre in Malta and at a later date available for the public. AI and VR will soon be helping children.

The full version of the article can be read in THINK issue 35 or accessed online. This edition focuses on the concept of preservation. Preservation centres around conservation and protection, whether it’s of our environment, our heritage, or our knowledge.