Online games trial to help children with uncontrollable eye movement

Researchers at the University of Southampton are trialling online games designed to assess the success of treatment for an eye condition that usually develops in childhood.

They’re asking people to try out the games for themselves.

Nystagmus causes rapid, uncontrollable eye movements – up and down, side to side, or in a circular motion – causing a person to have problems with vision, depth perception, balance and coordination. People are usually born with the condition or it can develop later on in life.

Treatment for Nystagmus, which affects one in 1,000 people in the UK, is very limited and varies according to the underlying cause, but currently doctors have to rely on standard vision tests to check if it’s been successful.

Now eye specialists, computer games experts and mathematicians have teamed up to design and test three prototype games, playable on a PC, which it’s hoped will accurately measure if a patient’s sight has improved. The ‘nystagME games’ have been funded by a generous donation from energy investors Bluewater to the University of Southampton’s Gift of Sight Appeal.

Dr Jay Self , Associate Professor of Ophthalmology at the University of Southampton, and Consultant at University Hospital Southampton (UHS), explains: “There’s no cure for Nystagmus, but there are a range of supportive treatments, for example wearing glasses, taking certain medications and even eye surgery. Some new treatments are being developed too and it’s important for us to be able to accurately measure their success.

“At the moment we can only tell how effective treatment has been by using standard eye test methods, such as static letter charts and field of vision tests, which don’t simulate real life situations at all. In the real world, when crossing a road for example, everything is moving and we need to see and recognise things quickly. These games allow us to measure how quickly someone can see, as well as how clearly.”

For example, in one of the games – which have been developed by University of Southampton spin-out company, Nucleolus Software – participants make a burger in a pretend fast-food kitchen. They visually check customer orders and then select the correct ingredients from different areas of the computer screen under timed conditions. Other challenges include finding hidden objects and matching and selecting items on screen.

Although primarily aimed at children (with parental permission), the team is appealing for people of all ages to try the games – capturing results from both those who have Nystagmus and those who don’t. By collecting data across a range of people, with varying vision, they aim to build a big picture of how participants with different abilities perform. From this anonymous comparative dataset they hope to find out which game works best as an outcome measure for treatment studies.

Mathematician at the University of Southampton, Professor Joerg Fliege , comments: “By combining the skills of designers, data specialists and clinicians, we think we are on the way to creating a new, engaging, fun way to assess people’s response to Nystagmus treatment – particularly for children who may struggle to engage with traditional tests.”

People can take part in the trial by visiting the Gift of Sight website here . By playing the games and giving feedback, they can help the researchers further develop them and take a positive step towards testing the vision of patients.