IDI Press Release – July 20, 1998

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

NIH Funds Voice-Controlled Multimedia Conversations
for Amputees and Their Family Caregivers

July 20, 1998 — Interactive Drama Inc. (IDI) of Bethesda, Maryland has received a $100,000 federal grant to develop a series of voice-controlled interactive software programs that amputees and their family caregivers can use to gain information and emotional support, especially during the early stages of their experience with limb loss. The Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) grant was recently awarded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the National Institute of Nursing Education.

The resulting programs—which will combine speech recognition and digital video technology on a CD-ROM—will allow amputees and amputee family caregivers to talk directly to video peers about their amputation experience, using a standard personal computer and microphone.

"The magic of dialogue is what we are creating," explains William G. Harless, Ph.D., president of IDI and principal investigator on the project. "The simple act of picking up and speaking into a microphone initiates a realistic ‘person-to-person’ dialogue with an amputee or caregiver whose video image fills the computer screen. Direct eye contact and give-and-take conversation with the video character draw the user in. An intelligent prompting system allows the user to conduct a meaningful, uninterrupted conversation with each video peer."

Users will be able to "meet" a variety of amputees and amputee family caregivers, hear their stories, and ask questions about the physical, psychological, and social impact of amputation, such as:

IDI researchers hypothesize that through these interactive programs, amputees and amputee family caregivers will gain first-hand knowledge from others who have experienced limb loss. "They will also feel reassured that they are not alone," says Harless.

Consultants from the Amputee Coalition of America, based in Knoxville, Tennessee, and the National Family Caregivers Association, based in Kensington, Maryland, will advise IDI researchers during the content development phase of the project to ensure that the questions frequently asked by amputees and family caregivers are covered in the series. IDI will field-test the programs with recent amputees and their family caregivers to determine whether practical knowledge and emotional support can be gained through this new educational method. The study will be conducted at Inova Fairfax Hospital in Falls Church, Virginia, and NASCOTT Rehabilitation Services in Fairfax, Virginia.

Traumatic accidents and diseases, such as diabetes and cancer, lead to 3,000 new amputations each week—more than 156,000 amputations annually—in the United States alone. Current estimates place the American amputee population above two million persons. In most cases, a family member assumes the role of primary caregiver, at least during the early stages of recovery and rehabilitation, effectively doubling the number of Americans personally affected by limb loss.

While amputees struggle with such key issues as body image and self-acceptance, mobility, and social reintegration, studies show that amputation also affects family caregivers physically and mentally. A recent, national survey of 178 amputees conducted at the Frazier Rehabilitation Center in Louisville, Kentucky, found that 87% of those polled felt their limb loss had placed "considerable stress" on their families.

Harless says that many amputees report feeling a lack of preparation and emotional support, especially in the early stages of limb loss. They also want to talk to other amputees about their experience, but this opportunity is not always available to them. And, Harless adds, there is currently no systematic method to help family caregivers adjust to their new circumstances. He points out that the Virtual Conversations® programs being developed under the SBIR grant address these problems.

IDI has been designing and producing voice-activated interactive software simulations—called Virtual Conversations® programs—to promote experiential learning since 1984. Early research and development of the method was supported by the National Library of Medicine. A rigorous national field test conducted in 1987 and funded by the NIH, demonstrated the intense intellectual and emotional involvement test subjects experience when they used Virtual Conversations® programs.

IDI has developed other medical applications of their method to:

IDI’s Virtual Conversations® method was awarded a patent (#5,006,987) in 1991. IDI research and development activities have been funded by grant awards from NIH and contracts from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency of the Department of Defense, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

For More Information Contact:

Marcia A. Zier
Interactive Drama Inc.
7900 Wisconsin Avenue Suite 200, Bethesda, MD 20814
Tel: 301.654.0676
FAX: 301.657.9174
Email: mzier@idrama.com