Why your doctor could soon give you a video game prescription

Gaming has always been condemned for glorifying violence and spawning a culture of decadence in urban youth. It now seems like the detractors got it wrong; at least part of it. A number of recent studies show that video games can improve your physical fitness and even sharpen your vision.
According to a study carried at the University of Rochester, playing some first-person action video games, such as Unreal Tournament improves visual acuity. The study shows that the human brain adapts to the extremities of the game. In this way, the brain is “trained” resulting in a significant increase in spatial resolution of vision. For people who normally don’t play video games, they will be able to see smaller, crammed objects much more clearly. “When people play action games, they’re changing the brain’s pathway responsible for visual processing,” says Professor Daphne Bavalier, from the University of Rochester. In future, patients could be turning to video games to treat visual impairment problems or tackling aging of the brain.
In another remarkable observation, the hugely successful Nintendo game consoles could end up giving rise to “virtual athletes”. Nintendo offers plenty of active sporting games including tennis, golf, baseball and boxing. A great deal of physical activity is involved which includes moving the biceps, shoulders and legs; which is very much like the real deal. Kids who played these active games used more energy than those playing conventional sedentary games. Testament to this is the case of Mickey DeLorenzo, a 26-year old developer from South Philadelphia who lost 9lbs (4.09kgs) in a span of 12 days. Recent findings show that Nintendo tops the video games console market, outgunning its chief rivals by a solid margin. We hope that the massive numbers of sold units will bring a new wave of active sports gaming. Strange times we are living in. Who would have foreseen video games getting cozy with the Medical profession? Case in point is the impending venture of Sony PS3 in assisting medical research.