Jogos Sérios para a Saúde: Estimulação Cognitiva em Doentes com a Demência Alzheimer com recurso ao Delaying Alzheimer

Abstract

Alzheimer's dementia is currently considered to be the dementia that affects a large number of the population. not only in Portugal but also worldwide. This disease is irreversible, however, studies indicate that betting on cognitive stimulation in the early stages is sure to be an asset, to slow cognitive decline. In this sense, with the development of this thesis dubbed the "Serious Games for Health: Cognitive Stimulation in Patients with Alzheimer's dementia using the Delaying Alzheimer" was executed by checking the state of the art on the chosen themes, followed by researching these themes in order to support the prototype and later on developing and evaluating. With data gathered through a questionnaire survey to 118 formal caregivers of AD patients, it was found that it was beneficial using games to promote cognitive stimulation in the early and intermediate stages of AD, but utilizing a digital game platform would be more advantageous as it would enable a developer to provide more functionality/ features. Using the research data as a basis, the "Delaying Alzheimer" prototype was developed, under the classification of serious game for health, whose main objective is to enable caregivers to conduct a computerized cognitive training session with AD patients and subsequent evaluation. The prototype development took into account the specifications defined in Game Design and went through a draft stage, wireframe and the elaboration phase of an interactive prototype. For validation of this interface, Nielsen's heuristics(1995) were applied. Finally, there was a preliminary assessment by doing a second questionnaire to 27 caregivers, which allowed to conclude that the prototype is considered easy to use for both caregivers and patients with AD, and possesses features that are an asset to the work of these caregivers, besides these conclusions, it was found that the game "Delaying Alzheimer" will be an ally in the promotion/evaluation of computerized cognitive training.