PlayPen XR for Occupational Therapy

Designing Video Games for Easier Burn Injury Rehabilitation Therapy

The PlayPen XR is an experimental project by the Creative Media and Behavioral Health Center, in collaboration with occupational therapists from the Southern California Burn Unit. This project aims to gamify rehabilitation exercises for burn injuries, providing motivation for therapy sessions and aiding in pain management during exercise. Guided by occupational therapists, we created game design documents and interactive prototypes for a suite of games and presented our prototypes to stakeholders.

"Pawsitive Recovery" is the game prototype I primarily worked on. This game focuses on both passive and active rehabilitation exercises for patients with hand burn injuries. Working with Sherry Xie, we used a pressure sensor to map the performance of hand exercises to on-screen game progression, providing patients with clearer goals and more positive feedback.