EXERGAME: ACTIVE VIDEO GAME SYSTEMS

EXERGAME: ACTIVE VIDEO GAME SYSTEMS
Research in recent years shows that people spend 4-5 hours a day with computers, television and video games. According to the same research, individuals who spend more than 4 hours a day in front of the screen do less physical activity. In other words, spending time in front of the screen leads people to sedentary life. So, how can we prevent inactivity in this period when technology is developing rapidly and we are exposed to more and more screens every day?
Exergame is a system that comes into our lives at this point and should be considered especially in this pandemic period when we are exposed to sedentary life. This system; we can think of it as exercising with video games, acting with it’s directions. So, systems that encourage you to exercise while playing your video games on the screen while imagining you are in those games. Many technology companies have contributed to the health, education and sports sectors by producing games and game consoles for this system. Now on the floor, on the wall, on the bike, while dancing etc. all kinds of games and devices can be accessed.
Physiotherapists are also working on these systems to encourage elderly people who do not exercise and children who constantly play video games to exercise at home, to prevent obesity, which is increasing in our age, in addition to traditional treatment programs in different areas such as joint diseases, autism, and heart diseases. It is a very important issue in physiotherapy that the patients find the treatment exciting and the exercises fun. In this respect, it is expected that the participation of patients in the treatment will be increased by exergame.
One of the important issues in physiotherapy is evaluation. We definitely evaluate the patients to see the progress of the treatment before, during and after the treatment. At this stage, exergame can help us as a guide with the scores in the games. It allows us to see the progress of individuals objectively, both for patients and for us. Thanks to the diversity of video games, it is sometimes aimed to try to develop capacity by providing online competitive games with competitors.
We can list the benefits of exergame as being able to be developed according to the needs of the people, to be designed for even a single joint in treatments, to increase motivation, to make exercise enjoyable, to be instructive. However, we should also try to eliminate the disadvantages of being a very new technology. For example, we still do not know how often it is beneficial to use it. More importantly, while trying to reduce screen time, it is not yet clear how we should go about exposing children to the screen for longer with exergame.
Even though studies on these issues are still ongoing, we should acknowledge the positive effects of exergame on people's physical activation levels and eliminate the damages that technology brings to our lives with the beneficial aspects of technology.

                                                                                                         Res. Asst. Öznur Kaya