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Leveling Up Cancer Education: How Serious Games Teach Families · Talking FACS

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  Welcome to Talking FACS, and thank you for tuning in to Cancer Conversations on Talking FACS,
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  a podcast collaboration between the University of Kentucky Markey Cancer Center
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  and the UK Martin-Gatton College of Agriculture, Food and Environments Cooperative Extension Service.
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  We will share with you the latest developments in cancer prevention,
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  diagnosis, treatment and research from the experts at Markey Cancer Center,
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  Kentucky's only National Cancer Institute designated Comprehensive Cancer Center.
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  Talking FACS is hosted by the UK Family and Consumer Sciences Extension Program.
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  Our educators share research knowledge with individuals, families and communities
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  to improve quality of life.
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  Who doesn't love a good game? Games are a great way to learn about social connections,
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  but it's also a good way to learn about lots of other things.
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  Welcome to Cancer Conversations on Talking Facts.
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  I'm your host, Mindy McCulley, Extension Specialist for Instructional Support
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  with Family and Consumer Sciences Extension at the University of Kentucky.
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  My guest today is Dr. Olufunmilola Abraham.
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  Dr. Abraham is Department Chair of the Department of Pharmacy,
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  Practice, and Science at the University of Kentucky in the College of Pharmacy.
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  She is also the U.S. Surgical Endowed Professor in Pharmacy Administration,
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  and the Director and Principal Investigator of the Collaborative Research on
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  Medication Use and Family Health Lab.
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  Welcome, Dr. Abraham. How are you? I'm doing well. Thank you for having me with you today.
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  Well, I am so excited to have this conversation with you about how we can use
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  gaming to enhance cancer education across Kentucky.
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  So, first of all, why is it so important that we improve cancer education and cancer awareness?
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  Cancer is something that impacts many families, almost most families around Kentucky.
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  It is not an easy chronic condition to be on. It's something that's managed
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  within a family unit with a support system.
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  And because of that challenge, I think we need creative ways to make sure the
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  patient, the support system, family members understand how to support the patient
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  through that cancer journey.
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  What approach does your lab take to guiding education in new and different ways?
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  So my research lab, the CARM lab, we are very passionate about community-engaged research.
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  A lot of our work is really driven by the needs of the community,
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  one of which is cancer. I've been doing cancer awareness work for probably over a decade.
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  And while I was at University of Wisconsin-Madison, really being encouraged
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  to think about how we can use,
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  serious games to teach about different types of cancers, especially with young
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  people and adults in general.
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  This is not something I'll take credit for. I would say.
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  Using gaming to teach about cancer has been around for a long time.
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  One of the most popular, successful games is called Remission.
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  It's much older developed by the Hope Lab.
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  And that kind of really piqued my interest, why we hadn't done more work in
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  that area and why we weren't looking to investigate this further and even expand
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  this to improving awareness for adolescents and adults in different areas of cancer.
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  I think games are relevant because this is something that's part of our lives.
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  Many of us play board games, our kids play games.
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  As a social scientist and pharmacist, I'm really into how can we take the things
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  that naturally occur in our lives and use that to improve health outcomes or
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  improve awareness about health conditions and safe and appropriate YouTube medicine.
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  And so for me, I really wanted to explore this further and started this journey
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  in one, trying to understand is this a possibility,
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  and finding that there is really a sound literature and evidence base that this
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  could be a valid way to improve understanding of the disease and improve awareness
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  within the family unit and support system.
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  So in your experience, are the benefits of using game-based learning to raise cancer awareness more?
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  Really different than we see with other types of outreach education? It's a great question.
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  I would say I haven't personally ran any studies to compare use of game-based
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  learning and traditional education.
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  I think in my mind, serious games are an additional way to provide that education,
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  in addition to what we're currently doing.
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  I think when we make interventions for a diverse group, We want to have options
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  that cater to that group, making sure they're responsive to their approach to learning.
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  So I think they're an additional way that show that, yes, we know games are
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  effective in educating on diabetes. And like I said, remission has been out there for many years.
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  I think what we haven't done enough of is exploring it for different types of
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  learning about cancer for youth and adults.
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  When we're talking about the games, you know, you mentioned board games.
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  These are not board games, right? They're online games. How do people work through them?
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  Is it like role-play gaming or, you know, some other type of game?
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  So what we call these types of games are what we call serious games.
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  That's a whole area of literature that I'm happy to talk more about if that's of interest.
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  But serious games essentially are defined as games that are not necessarily
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  for pure entertainment, but are used to teach about serious topics,
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  one of them which could be health.
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  So we call those types of serious games serious games for health purposes.
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  Okay. And so this is a really growing field in digital healthcare based off
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  of rapid development of information in this space and knowing that there are
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  potential and natural use in other learning spaces.
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  So when we talk about serious games, that's what we mean. They typically are
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  games that are playable on a mobile phone, playable on a tablet,
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  or playable on a Chromebook or a computer.
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  They could be designed in different ways. They could be role-play.
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  They could be narrative.
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  But oftentimes, they're games that you're playing on mobile devices or computers,
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  and that could be easily accessed, and they could be interactive or immersive.
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  But the key is they're using game-based theory or to engage people in learning
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  and assessing that they're alone.
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  So they're not mainly for enjoyment, but really to enhance the motivation to learn and engage.
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  And critical topics. They are very serious topics, but this kind of makes learning
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  more fun, I would assume.
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  Right. It's better than, at least for me, I think about the paper I get when
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  I pick up a prescription in the pharmacy.
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  I'm a pharmacist and I can tell you, I don't always read that.
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  And I know for my kids, if there's something more interactive.
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  They're more likely to engage in that information.
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  And I think that's what this approach does.
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  It gives us an additional resource to provide for different kinds of loans,
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  right? Because what matters the most is they are learning what we want them
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  to learn, or we have a way to assess their learning.
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  Can we make sense of the information around topics like cancer and other chronic conditions?
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  And I think they also could provide an opportunity for health care providers
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  to really know where their patients and family caregivers are at in terms of
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  health, important health information that they want to communicate.
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  And I'm assuming that as the science changes, then you're able to make modifications,
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  to the game so that people know almost in real time what's changing with their condition.
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  One of the things I appreciate about games is you update them.
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  You can create mini series new scenarios, you can add on them,
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  add to the games. So there are living documents, living tools that you could keep modifying.
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  I think that's where it has to be pretty powerful. I love that too.
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  And I know that you've done some work with our youth populations.
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  What have you found as you explore gaming with them? Because,
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  you know, they're the gaming experts, right?
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  That is an excellent question.
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  That's actually part of why I got really interested in this.
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  Many years ago, I received funding to study youth perspectives around cancer
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  awareness, as cancer education and the possibility of using GainAid.
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  We ran focus groups with middle school on asking them to tell us their thoughts
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  about cancer and cancer education and prevention and,
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  if they would be interested in using a Gain-based approach to learning.
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  We learned a lot. One of the things we learned is they liked being able to customize
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  characters, build in stories that they could relate with and make choices.
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  And that was very intriguing to them.
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  Rather than getting information from lectures, books, videos, or websites.
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  One of the things we did in this project was we had them also tell us how they would design the game.
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  So we learned a lot. And that informed future work.
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  So from what we know, serious games could really provide that additional support
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  to help kids understand about cancer prevention and at-risk factors and.
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  Their preferences for knowing about this.
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  Well, and I would say whether the young person is the patient or they have a family member who,
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  is the patient, it really helps
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  to understand how the process is happening with whatever cancer it is.
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  And so I'm sure that using the game to help them understand how,
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  you know, what's going on with me or what's going on with mom or dad or grandma
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  or whoever is really beneficial.
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  No, you're correct. One of the things that I love games is I think it's also
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  a tool to bring families together.
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  One of the things our lab encourages is for games to be played as a family unit.
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  Oh, great. I think they serve as an opportunity to start conversations about
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  difficult topics and have kind of meet at a shared place where we both played the game and,
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  What did we learn or what didn't we like about it?
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  I think it provides an additional communication tool about really difficult things. Great. Yeah.
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  I think that this is a fabulous tool and I'm excited that it's available.
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  And how are families in Kentucky able to get this information or get access to these games?
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  Well, that is wonderful. So currently, one of our cancer-related games that's
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  been around the longest is called Outsmart Cancer.
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  It focuses broadly on educating on cancer awareness.
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  It doesn't focus specifically on any types of cancer. I think we highlight lung
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  cancer and a few cancers in there.
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  And typically, again, we're a community-engaged lab. We like to partner with
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  communities and showcase many of our games at community events.
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  We partner with schools, the healthcare system that invite us and we table at
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  these events and let families just play through the games.
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  Otherwise, people can reach out to us and we're happy to let them play through some of these games.
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  We will, of course, put your information in the show notes so that people can
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  click on the link and find you to learn more about cancer through gaming.
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  Talking about this avenue of learning on Cancer Conversations is just another
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  way to help people understand.
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  What it is to have cancer or what it is to live with a family member who has
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  been diagnosed or even to just have greater understanding throughout the community.
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  Dr. Abraham, I thank you so much for your time today.
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  Thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate the opportunity.
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  It is. It's always fun to talk about something new for a topic that is so serious.
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  So this is a great, great way to do that.
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  If you are just tuning in, you're listening to Cancer Conversations on Talking
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  FACS, and we are a partnership between the University of Kentucky Markey Cancer
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  Center and the Kentucky Cooperative Extension Service.
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  Thank you for listening to Cancer Conversations on Talking FACS.
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  Our goal is to connect you with the latest advances in cancer research in the Commonwealth.
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  If you enjoyed today's podcast and have a suggestion for a future show topic,
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  Please message us on the UK Markey Cancer Center Facebook page at facebook.com/UKMarkey
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  or visit our website at markey.uky.edu for more information.
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  You can find University of Kentucky Family and Consumer Sciences Extension programs
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  at your local Extension office or online at fcs.uky.edu.
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  Building strong families, building Kentucky. It starts with us.