A Hospital MR Navigation Design for Elderly People’s Medical Needs

Abstract

As China has a large population with a large elderly group, in first-tier cities with a concentrated population, medical resources do not match the population. In particular, the average daily outpatient reception is large in tertiary hospitals. Taking a hospital in Beijing as an example, the average daily outpatient reception is about 10,400 person-times. The complex medical environment and various procedures also lead to patients need to constantly look for the next target department for a long time. Even if there are a few volunteers in the lobby to guide, the medical treatment process is still a challenge for elderly patients. The guidance of hospital departments is generally based on conventional text signs and some hospitals also try to use the indoor positioning and navigation system of smart phones to give instructions, but the difficulties of unaccompanied elderly people in smart phone applications are not taken into account. Mixed Reality (MR) holds the promise of presenting navigational instructions directly into the patient’s field of vision, creating a humanoid sign of a virtual guide in the patient’s vision, thus achieving the same effect as a human guide. From the beginning of entering the hospital, the virtual guide sign will automatically plan the medical route for the patient, which can save the time for the elderly to ask the medical staff for directions and understand the guide sign and the medical treatment process; moreover, the sense of companionship generated by the virtual humanoid sign based on Mixed Reality (MR) can alleviate the anxiety of the elderly patients when they seek medical treatment to some extent. Although there are still many problems to be discussed in the specific application and practical operation of the technology, the virtual humanoid guide sign with the nature of companion can still become an important design direction of the future hospital navigation system.