Video games used for physical therapy

San Francisco: Video games are being tested as a way to treat people with disabilities. Therapeutic games are now being designed to get players to do a series of exercises targeted to their health condition.

Now Parkinson's sufferers can play the game "RailRunner" which helps them regain balance and gait.

The basic idea behind the game is to get these patients to perform simple excercises like standing up and sitting down.

The game is corrective - if a gesture isn't completed correctly or the player uses a compensatory movement, the expected action, like the advancement of the rail cart, doesn't occur.

The game works because it is very different from any other...and the movements are specifically tailored to combat the functional deficits that people with Parkinson's disease experience.

The games may be coming at the right time - baby boomers are aging, and these relatively tech-savvy seniors could be ideal candidates for video game-based physical therapy.

According to Parkinson's patient Sue Lifschiz....she would recommend the game because it is something that a person can do at a level they can handle. They get instant feedback on their improvement and they can regulate the difficulty of the game. People at different stages of the disease can set the game at different levels.

The game's developers are already seeing positive results, and not just from Parkinson's patients.

For the cerebral palsy game, the challenge was to provide feedback to encourage the correct motions. The team discovered that children trying the game would correct their posture immediately if the plane they were flying turned red in mid-flight.