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Collabortation

Virtuelle Realität: HP geht neue Wege bei der Interaktion mit seinen Partnern

Mit einem neuen Tool ermöglicht HP VR-basierte Trainings und Workshops für deutsche Reseller. Der Hersteller bietet seinen Partner damit die Möglichkeit, sich künftig zu Kundentrainings und Workshops in der virtuellen Realität zu treffen.

Damit geht HP Deutschland einen weiteren konkreten Schritt hin zu neuen hybriden Begegnungsformaten. Wesentliches Ziel ist es, den Partnern HP-Produkte und -Lösungen mit Hilfe von Virtual Reality näher zu bringen und die Schulungen und Trainings interaktiver zu gestalten.

Entwickelt in Zusammenarbeit von Ingram Micro und Z Reality, sowie angetrieben von dem „Z by HP“-Portfolio, bietet das neue Trainingssystem eine realitätsnahe Alternative zu gewohnten Veranstaltungsformaten. Im Rahmen der zweitägigen Premiere, einem Training zu den neusten Workstation-Modellen und Data-Science-Anwendungen, haben sich 13 Partner aus ganz Deutschland erstmals in der virtuellen Realität ausgetauscht.

„Natürlich wird es auch weiterhin persönliche Trainings und Treffen mit den Partnern geben. Aber mit dem neuen Konzept tragen wir dem Wunsch unserer Partner Rechnung, verstärkt auch auf hybride Trainingsformate zu setzen“, unterstreicht Susanne Kummetz, Director Commercial und Consumer Channel bei HP Deutschland nach der Premiere. „Die VR-Umgebung ermöglicht es, neue Produkte fast real zu erleben. Damit bietet die Technologie ein völlig neues Schulungserlebnis ohne großen Reiseaufwand.“

Quelle:

Foto: Immersive Trainingsumgebung: Getestet wurde das neue Tool bei einem zweitägigen Workshop mit 13 Partnern. (Bild: HP Deutschland)

https://www.pbs-business.de/news/lieferanten/10-11-2021-hp-geht-neue-wege-bei-der-interaktion-mit-seinen-partnern/

25. November 2021 0 comment

Knowledge Research

Mursion’s Human Powered Tech Stack

Mursion (a foreshortened form of Immersion) is used as an immersive VR training and development tool that enables executives, health care professionals, classroom teachers, and customer service representatives to practice interpersonal skills with a wide range of personalities. It uses human simulation specialists who, as avatars, work with participants in diverse training scenarios using AI to create a whole cast of virtual characters a specialist can use in the simulations. Thanks to a convergence of motion capture, computer vision, GP-3 natural language processing, AI assisted body language, and voice morphing, the company is able to put humans in the tech stack.

Used in combination with artificial intelligence and actors Mursion can deliver powerful and personalized simulations. Sessions can be run by one of Mursion’s eighty simulation specialists, or by the client themselves (trained by Mursion, of course). The demo on my laptop was led by “Michael,” a virtual host, who explained the situation in the simulation. As you can see from the photo, Michael is decidedly not photorealistic, but rather resembles a character from The Sims. Michael explained the scenario we were going to role play. I was to be an executive who had to counsel a high-performing employee, “Lisa,” who has lately been so impatient with colleagues, and dismissive of others in meetings, that several of her co-workers complained. Unknown to me, Michael was not a real executive. She – or he – is a Mursion simulation specialist, working through an interface that allows them to play any age, and any gender.

Michael, my AI-assisted trainer. Mursion

My conversation with Lisa was hard. I had an uncomfortable flashback to these sorts of human resources tasks managers must do even if, like me, they have no training or practice in doing so. I said a lot of wrong things that hurt and misled people. Mursion could solve that. Great job by Michael playing Lisa. Or was Lisa playing Michael? I was also treated to a classroom of six “gifted elementary school students,” also run by my invisible sim specialist, who did an excellent job asking questions about my work at Disney without really listening to the answers.

“There is so much nuance to interpersonal communication especially in stressful circumstances,” Co-founder and CEO Mark Atkinson said in a recent interview. “At some point we may not need humans, but for theforeseeable future we’re depending on our simulation specialists to deliver the cognition and empathy that AI can’t do..” I was surprised at first that I was working with an avatar on my 2D computer screen, like a video game. Except this is no simple avatar. There’s eye contact. They breathe. And they deliver a personalized performance so convincing the cartooniness fades away and becomes a heightened reality. It felt like I was there. Technology augmented the actor, giving them superpowers.

Sarah French, a performing artist, has been working with Mursion since they started as a research … [+] Mursion

I have said many times in this column that VR is going to be an important source of employment for actors all over the world. I was introduced to Sarah French, an actor based in Central Florida, who heartily agreed with the proposition. She is a conservatory trained member of Actor’s Equity Association who performs at theme parks, in theaters, film and television who’s been working with Mursion from its beginning as a research project. Now, she hires and trains all the new sim specialists. “We want to make it the learner’s show,” she told me. “The actor is not the star. When they show up with costumes asking for sides, they’re performing in the old way. In the new way, you’re acting with a game controller in your hand.”

Simulation specialists are not psychologists, nor are they trained human resources professionals. French says they don’t have to be. “I like to ask a lot of questions. I use my acting tools to be the employee or the customer.” Although there is no script, French and the other sim specialists do interview the subjects in advance to learn about their jobs and the kind of interpersonal challenges they face. There are many scenarios that are common to many businesses, for example the problems facing classroom teachers.

More often than not, Mursion’s AI assisted sim specialists are internal to the client, e.g. provided by the company itself, which licenses the full front and back end for internal use. Often clients work with Mursion specialists to prepare a program that they can deploy at scale on their own.

Mursion is based on research done by co-founder Arjun Nagendran when he was post-doctoral researcher at the University of Central Florida in Orlando. It was there he began to study VR and robotics, later going on to become a research assistant professor at the Institute for Simulation. Over his six years there, his research yielded patents and helped secure funding for the program and, ultimately, for the new company. In 2015, he partnered with serial entrepreneur Atkinson. Prior to launching Mursion, Atkinson served as a visiting scholar at the Graduate School of Education at Stanford University and an executive in residence at the New Schools Venture Fund. Mark previously co-founded Teachscape, serving as chairman and CEO for 12 years. At Teachscape, Mark served as an advisor to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s Measures of Effective Teaching Project.

Mursion has raised more than $35 million, with investments from Leeds Illuminate, Juvo Ventures, Figure 8 Investments, Zoma Capital, New Markets Venture Fund, and the New School Venture Fund. The San Francisco based company now has 95 full-time employees and an additional 85 part-time simulation specialists.

Quelle:

Charlie Fink

https://www.forbes.com/sites/charliefink/2021/06/07/mursions-human-powered-tech-stack/?sh=39851b6f1811

21. Juni 2021 0 comment

Examples

The Use of Virtual Reality Environments for Medical Training

Virtual reality (VR) technology is the use of a headset to replace the real world with a digitally rendered environment. The user takes part in a simulated experience and can interact with their virtual surroundings and virtual characters. Although VR technology has been available since the 1970s, recent advances in technology have vastly increased its usefulness and application.

The health-care sector is beginning to recognize the potential of VR for a range of medical uses, with some expecting the sector to become the most prevalent application of VR outside of gaming. Recent trials have shown it to be an effective tool for the management of acute and chronic pain, as it provides a distraction from stimuli and decreases an individual’s perception of pain.[1] VR has also been used to explore the response of doctors to important ethical issues such as the overprescription of antibiotics.[2] The technology is showing some promising signs as a rehabilitation tool too, for example, for poststroke patients [3] and children with cerebral palsy.[4]

VR is also proving to be an excellent way of training health-care professionals. It can be a challenge to ensure that all medics are trained to the same standard, especially as access to the latest equipment is often limited. VR technology can be used to train medical professionals on new techniques and technologies in a cost-effective way, ensuring consistency and removing the need to take important equipment out of service.

As with most new technologies, there has been some initial scepticism from practitioners to the introduction of VR, but this is diminishing as more use cases are created and results documented.

Immerse has been working with GE Healthcare to create a VR training tool for completing computed tomography coronary angiography (CTCA) scans. The updated National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) clinical guidelines suggest CTCA as the first line of investigation for patients with chest pain in both typical and atypical circumstances.[5] Highly sensitive, it can diagnose coronary artery disease and help detect those at risk of having a cardiac problem in the future. It is an excellent tool for ruling out coronary disease as the reason for chest pain.

CTCA is still quite a new technique, and it can only be performed using relatively modern CT scanners – there are currently only 228 cardiac capable scanners in the UK. This means that there are very few radiologists trained in CTCA: as of 2014, the UK had 48 CTCA-trained radiologists per million population, compared with 92/million in Germany, 112/million in Spain, and 130/million in France.[6]

The Royal College of Radiologists and the British Society of Cardiovascular Imaging estimate that in 2017, there was a shortfall of 43% in the number of CTCA scans that should have been performed in the UK if the NICE guidelines had been followed.[7]

In the UK, there is no formal, consistent training pathway for CTCA scanning. Current training is usually limited to 3–5 days of offsite training, generally consisting of lectures, case study reviews, and literature.

GE Healthcare wanted to address these restrictions by creating a VR environment that simulated the hands-on experience of completing CTCA scans. Their aim was to make a training tool that could be accessed 24/7, reducing the need for onsite training and therefore lowering training costs and minimizing health risks to patients. Ultimately, this should mean that more radiographers are CTCA trained, leading to better assessment of patients and better outcomes.

Working closely with GE Healthcare and subject-matter experts (cardiology and CTCA-trained radiographers), Immerse developed a detailed VR environment with various patient case studies to play-through, each with differing modes (modules) to allow the user to be either guided or unguided.

The patient setup involves multiple interactions, from calling a doctor, talking to the patient, attaching leads to them, controlling their heart rate, and then positioning them in the scanner. There is a fully simulated software interaction flow for acquiring the final scan images, using a design that is generic enough to be applied to any scanner. For future versions, a third “assessment” mode is planned, for users to run through the simulation completely unguided, with data from the session fed into Immerse’s reporting platform for further analysis and playback. This allows the simulation to be used as part of a formal assessment program.

Radiographers who have tested the CTCA program so far have given positive feedback, welcoming the ease-of-use and the detail of the simulation. In situ beta-tests have taken place at several UK hospitals, and we are currently working with GE Healthcare to roll out the program globally.

VR is so effective in a health-care training context because it is completely engaging and immersive, accurately replicating the experience of dealing with a variety of patients and equipment. Gamification can also be applied to add competitive elements, encouraging staff to revisit modules to improve their skills and scores. While the effectiveness of training has historically been hard to measure, VR changes this: simulations such as the CTCA program capture huge amounts of data, which Immerse technology presents back to employers, enabling the tracking of progress, outcomes, and offering insights for improvements and future training. Data can be collected on an individual as well as an aggregated level, so that simulations can then be personalized to suit individual users. Insights will only improve as more advanced data capture techniques are integrated, including eye-tracking, biometric technology, and even brainwave monitoring.

VR has a critical role to play in the future of health-care training. As our work with GE Healthcare shows, using a realistic VR training simulation brings financial and logistical benefits. It can help overcome barriers to training including access to equipment, time and location limitations, and a lack of relevant patient types on whom to practice. However, the key to any successful adoption is getting the technology into the hands of the key influencers and turning them into advocates. In the case of health-care training, this means working closely with medical professionals to develop VR solutions that are truly useful, relevant, and applicable.

References

Pourmand A, Davis S, Marchak A, Whiteside T, Sikka N. Virtual reality as a clinical tool for pain management. Curr Pain Headache Rep 2018;22:53.
Pan X, Slater M, Beacco A, Navarro X, Bellido Rivas AI, Swapp D, et al. The responses of medical general practitioners to unreasonable patient demand for antibiotics – A study of medical ethics using immersive virtual reality. PLoS One 2016;11:e0146837.
De Luca R, Lo Buono V, Leo A, Russo M, Aragona B, Leonardi S, et al. Use of virtual reality in improving poststroke neglect: Promising neuropsychological and neurophysiological findings from a case study. Appl Neuropsychol Adult 2019;26:96-100.
Pourazar M, Mirakhori F, Hemayattalab R, Bagherzadeh F. Use of virtual reality intervention to improve reaction time in children with cerebral palsy: A randomized controlled trial. Dev Neurorehabil 2018;21:515-20.
“Chest Pain of Recent Onset: Assessmenzt and Diagnosis” Available from: https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/cg95. [Last accessed on 2019 July 01].
“How the Next Government can Improve Diagnosis and Outcomes for Patients: Four Proposals from the Royal College of Radiologists.” Available from: https://www.rcr.ac.uk/sites/default/files/RCR(15) 2_CR_govtbrief.pdf. [Last accessed on 2019 July 01].
Wise J. CT scan shortage endangers angina patients, say radiologists. BMJ 2018;363:k4719.

Quelle:

The Use of Virtual Reality Environments for Medical Training

10. Juni 2020 0 comment