Memoir monopoly: A rehabilitation game for elderly living with dementia

Purpose: Tools are needed in Taiwan for rehabilitation of the elderly living with dementia, because the tools imported from overseas or initially designed for children are not age-appropriate. Most paper-made rehabilitation tools have the drawbacks of inflexible designs and limited ability to stimulate the user. This paper presents the development of a rehabilitation game app called Memoir Monopoly (MM) (Figures 1 & 2), which is designed to engage persons living with dementia in rehabilitation activities. Working with an occupational therapist, we designed a highly flexible reminiscing rehabilitation game app that allows elderly who are living with dementia to have interactive activities, including structured reminiscing, cognitive training, reality orientation, sensory stimulation, and social events. Method: We adapted research through a user-experience design process to conduct the MM project. First, user-experience research (UXR) of the tools currently used in rehabilitation by elderly living with dementia revealed the need for a more interactive reminiscing game. Second, based on UXR findings, we designed a highly flexible 'reminiscing' and touchable rehabilitation game across four iPads with sharing screen sync and tokens that have user faces on the surface for physical indications and interactions. Each individual's iPad was used to collect personal photos and preferences at home. When placed together for a group reminiscence rehab session, the individual contents were pulled together by the hosting occupational therapist to responsively create a unique map for the participants with the proper level of difficulty to suit their personal experiences, increase their interests, and encourage their recall of the past. Various cognitive stimuli, including watching movie clips, listening to favorite songs, and touching interactive games, help participants to experience a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction in the rehab process. Results & Discussion: For a field test, MM was successfully brought once into one group rehab event at day care centers. Based on the observations and interview of the therapist and center caregivers, we found that elderly living with dementia who participated in the test were more actively willing to share their stories, using their own photos and movies, and were also interested in playing the reminiscence games, compared to their previous paper game events. This preliminary research result demonstrates that our design may resolve problems found in UXR. A game matching their life experiences and various interactions did encourage the elderly to participate in the reminiscence game. If reminiscence supports memory function, there is the potential that engaging in this type of group activity may improve the quality of life for elderly who are living with dementia.