Ayogo doesn’t ask why gamify health care but why not instead “healthify” blockbuster games? It’s an interesting twist to the current trend of ‘gamifying’ everything, from the number of steps we take each day to making better choices in our diet. At Ayogo, a Vancouver B.C. mobile gaming company, they believe games can be used as effective tools for motivating and educating the common person, like me, and modify behavior in a fun and playful manner. They believe that if you want to help patients do the things that will help change their chronic conditions they need to modify those behaviors in order to live healthier lives, such as adhere to a schedule medication; the best way to motivate users is to make it playful.
Playful! Hear that health care?
There seems to be a growing trend for game developers to not only to entertain folks using console & social networks, but to create game apps for the health sector. Ayogo’s social games and apps engage, educate, and empower patients with chronic conditions by visualizing and quantifying their actions. Over time patients will see that their small changes in diet or exercise (or whatever health attributes they wish to measure) can improve over time.