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CfP: 5th conference on Games for Health Europe 27-28 Oct. 2014

The Games for Health Conference brings together researchers, medical professionals and game developers to share information about the impact of games, playful interaction and game technologies on health, health care and health policy. Over three days, more than 400 attendees will participate in over 60 sessions provided by an international array of 80 speakers, cutting across a wide range of activities in health and health care. Topics include exergaming, physical therapy, disease management, health behavior change, biofeedback, scientific validation, rehabilitation, epidemiology, training, cognitive health, nutrition and education.

Submission deadline: May 1th, 2014

http://www.gamesforhealtheurope.org/call-for-submissions-20141.  Background

Founded in 2004, the Games for Health Project supports community, knowledge and business development efforts to use cutting-edge games and game technologies to improve health and health care.

The aim of the conference is to bring together academics and practitioners working within the field of game & play design, game development and the medical community to explore and innovate within the area of health. The conference provides an excellent opportunity to showcase practice and to mainstream research ideas and outcomes. It will introduce a wider audience to key findings and products from research and will illustrate how practice feeds back into and informs research. The conference will create a forum for two-way communication between the academic and practitioner communities and particularly welcomes end-user presentations and workshops. The programme will include presentations of papers, workshops, a doctoral consortium and an exhibition space for demonstrations and posters.

2. Call for Papers

The conference calls for short & long papers (find details below) from multidisciplinary expertise in health care, gamification and the design for games & play. Studies that focus on the patient, centred within his or her individual medical, social and cultural context (peers, relatives) addressing different stakeholders (doctors, hospitals), are especially encouraged.

3. Scope and topics

This call for papers is intended to solicit contributions from an international audience on recent developments and experiments that:

·         Present innovative and state-of-the-art design and applications,

·         Share experiences, insights, best-practices and lessons-learned,

·         Report the results of technical and social evaluations with regards to playful interaction and serious game design related to health care,

·         Report scientific insights on development and efficacy of gameplay in professional and patient education,

·         Report results of longitudinal studies, actual implementation of game-based solutions and (alternative) business cases,

·         Discuss and highlight the key challenges and future developments within the domain.

Topics sought include, but are not limited to:

·         Design process and evaluation, such as the accessibility or the efficacy of games & play in health care.

·         Game-based and playful solutions to behaviour change, persuasive healthcare problems and motivational aspects of games,

·         Issues related to specific target groups such as assistive technologies for people with disabilities, elderly people (‘silver games’), toddlers, hospitalized children, etc.

·         Participatory health. Self authored content and personalisation in games and playful interaction. Audience involvement. Lifestyle-embedded gaming.

·         Game based learning and the social and collaborative aspects of play,

·         Studies that capitalize on the ability of games to distract patients’ attention from aversive symptoms,

·         Studies into physical therapy and physical fitness using video game technology,

·         Game related technology such as visualization, contemporary games controllers, navigation in (virtual) environments, remote control, brain control to create new opportunities in health and rehabilitation applications

·         Serious games for training and (professional) education.

4. Submission and Proceedings

We welcome both short & full papers. Full papers should report original work within game & play design and health care and may address any of the areas listed in the conference topics. Papers should clearly state contribution(s) in the paper and the abstract. Papers making one clear, significant contribution are more likely to be accepted than papers making several lesser contributions. Papers must identify and cite relevant published work and explain how the paper furthers state of the art within game & play design and health care

All accepted papers will be included in the conference proceedings published by Springer.

Full submissions must not exceed 10 pages in length including references and should be submitted through the EasyChair submission system. Full papers should be anonymized and adhere the format provided in the template.

Short papers should report original work and may address any of the areas listed in the conference topics. Compared to full papers, short papers can be more exploratory and preliminary in nature, they can report on going work-in progress, or present a concrete contribution of a more narrow and specific scope. Papers must identify and cite relevant published work and explain how the paper furthers state of the art within game & play design and health care.
Short papers must not exceed 4 pages in length including references and should be submitted through the EasyChair submission system. Short papers should as well be anonymized and adhere to the format provided in the template.

5. Important Dates

Submission is open from February 15th 2014, through the EasyChair conference system: https://www.easychair.org/conferences/?conf=gfheu2014.

We only accept papers following the manuscript guidelines of Springer, given on the Web page: http://www.springer.com/computer/lncs?SGWID=0-164-6-793341-0

Please note at least one author of each accepted paper must register for the conference.

Submission Deadline:                         May 1th, 2014
Notification of Acceptance:              June 15th, 2014
Final Submission:                                July 7th, 2014

6. Editors

Prof. Dr. Ben Schouten BA
Eindhoven University of Technology,
The Netherlands
b.a.m.schouten@tue.nl

Dr. Marlies Schijven, MD MHSc
Academic Medical Center of Amsterdam
The Netherlands
m.p.schijven@amc.uva.nl

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