Digital Catalysts for Noncommunicable Disease Prevention Serious Games and Gamified Applications: Framework Design...

Area of Science:

• Health Informatics
• Digital Health
• Behavioral Science

Background:

• Noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) are a growing global health crisis, causing 74% of all deaths.
• Key risk factors include physical inactivity, tobacco use, poor diet, alcohol, and mental health.
• Limited individual decision-making contributes to NCD risk factors.

Purpose of the Study:

• To present design and standardization considerations for medical and game data exchange.
• To maximize the impact and usefulness of serious games and gamified applications for NCD prevention.
• To enable lasting behavior change by integrating educational content and behavior change techniques.

Main Methods:

• Developed a foundation of serious games and gamified applications for NCD prevention.
• Conducted a comprehensive analysis to identify 6 key areas for an interoperable framework.
• Defined and evaluated the framework against existing NCD prevention games and applications.

Main Results:

• Introduced a novel interoperable framework for designing NCD prevention games and applications.
• The framework defines 6 key areas, emphasizing interoperability and data exchange.
• Facilitates sustainable behavior change and improved health and well-being through meaningful data exchange.

Conclusions:

• The framework addresses key design and implementation aspects for NCD prevention games.
• Researchers should adopt these guidelines for developing novel serious games and applications.
• Promotes the use of medical informatics standards for semantic interoperability and improved patient care and research.