Dunedin Hospital staff were invited to play video games yesterday - but the virtual reality technology they were trying out has serious medical purposes.
A range of VR programs were available for trial, including training programmes which enable people to take a virtual trip through the human body, and a cellphone based program designed to soothe anxious children about to have an MRI scan.
Arguably the most significant program on show was the virtual reality rendering of the soon-to-be-opened new Intensive Care Unit.
A two-stage development, the first part opens in two months and virtual reality has been used throughout the design process to ensure accessibility, usability and safety issues have been addressed, before even a single nail is hammered.
Virtual walk-throughs had solved several potential problems before they arose, including fixing a corner where two beds being rolled towards each other could not get past, and
ensuring all beds could be seen from the nurses' stations.
''It's much more practical and safe than getting all the staff walking through a building site,'' ICU clinical director Craig Carr said.
After proving its worth in the ICU rebuild, VR technology would likely be extensively used in the design of the new Dunedin Hospital.
Dr Carr was keen to use VR to develop was the patient's perspective of the wards.
''A patient lying in a bed at ICU waiting to go into theatre, they are spending a lot of their time staring at the ceiling,'' he said.
''One thing we could be doing is seeing what a patient's journey looks like from a bed ... one thing we discovered in the UK was by doing simple things like putting in nice light installations, soothing pictures of rainbows and waterfalls, anxiety went down, blood pressure went down, heart rates came down.''
