Game Technology in Medical Education

My dissertation at the University of Maryland focused on the impact of new innovations on established business practices, specifically the use of 3D computer graphics, interactive computers, networking, and intelligent software in medical education. I began with the introduction of simulation devices in teaching anesthesiology in the late 1960's with SimOne. That technology had been transferred directly from military training.

This book explores the research that has already been done in evaluating the effectiveness of simulation and gaming technologies in medical education. It is especially interested in the benefits that are derived from these technologies.

1. Lower Cost of Delivering Education
   
2. Better Access to Learning Events
   
3. Reduced Time to Achieve Proficiency
   
4. Reduced Errors in Later Practice
   

After analyzing over 250 papers in the medical literature I demonstrated that evidence already exists that all four of these are true under specific conditions. Therefore, the medical education field is currently in a position to adopt these technologies and reap the benefits that come from them.

Lead User Innovation

In most industries, R&D is done by a specific in-house department. However, for many products there is a leading edge group of users who buy the product and immediately make modifications to meet their very unique needs. Eric von Hippel (2005) of the MIT Sloan School of Management has studied the impact of "lead users" on the development of new features for products. He describes this effect in windsurfing, mountain biking, and open source software. These customers are effectively an external R&D lab for the company’s products. von Hippel argues that they need to be enrolled by the company as partners in identifying and developing features for the next generation of products. Three criteria must exist for this to be effective: (1) the users must have an incentive to innovate, (2) they must have an incentive to reveal their innovations and share them, and (3) their work must be at a competitive level with innovations created internally and by competing companies.

von Hippel’s book Democratizing Innovation is available as a free download on his web site: http://web.mit.edu/evhippel/www/books.htm