Augmented Reality goes far away and beyond the limits of everybody’s imagination, it can be used for complex matters such as Neurosurgery or even to teach some of the most basic principles in life; for instance health education, which is easy to underestimate, as many people ignore that it is the introduction to the human body and important facts and strategies that teach our children to prevent many different illnesses while promoting a general state of health, basically: our future.
The Al Jalila Foundation, an organization founded in April 2013 by the Vice-President and Prime Minister of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, knows how fundamental Health education is, and that’s why when the opportunity emerged at the ‘Destination Medicine Summit 2017’, an event hosted by the Mohammed Bin Rashid University of Medicine and Health Sciences with the participation of 2000 Emirati students from 40 schools that have the goal to inspire them to pursue careers in medicine and healthcare; they took it, and along with two Dubai based innovative companies presented the Augmented Reality experience ‘Health is a Choice’, which was the first of its own in UAE (or anywhere that we know of) to target school-aged population and achieving it in a satisfactory and engaging way.
This system may look simple, it consists of having boards with health related information displayed as any other exposition would do it but, the difference is how it merges the experience with Augmented Reality by having the users install an application on any device (such as smartphones and tablets) and by looking to the boards through the dispositive integrated camera they will see 3D rendered interactive images that helped them understand the content of the board, piquing their interest and making it more memorable while helping fixate those contents in their minds, anyone can guess that the kids were having a great time by looking at the photos below.
Interesting topics such as Prevention of Diabetes, Arteries, Blood, Atherosclerosis, dentistry and the respiratory system was boarded by the experience. The experience consisted on having 3D images of this organs in a ‘healthy state’, sort of a Mixed Reality experience, and then by having the students waving their hands in front of it they will change from ‘healthy’ to ‘sick’ state, giving the students a different experience from what they used to, enjoying it in the process.
This experience, it’s just another proof that Augmented Reality, no matter what the field is, can make a difference for its users, showing new and exciting ways to learn and understand a whole variety of topics, today we are seeing how successful it was for school-age children, and we cannot do more than applaud the Al jalila Foundation along with Smart Yotta (Digital health innovation) and Physux Lab (technology development); three institutions that worked in collaboration with courage and knowledge to bring Augmented Reality successfully into such an important and delicate matter as the health education of their children. We will be looking forward to what else they bring to the table in the near future!.
What did you thought about it? would you like to have an exhibition like this in your city? please let us know your doubts and suggestions in the comments section.
