Little Journey is an interactive, virtual reality (VR) app designed to prepare children aged 3 to 12 years old for day-case surgery. It has been created by Dr Chris Evans, an anaesthetic trainee with an interest in reducing children’s anxiety surrounding surgery and improving their hospital experience. It has been co-designed by patients, members of the public (including primary school teachers), general practitioners, and the hospital multi-disciplinary team including paediatric anaesthetists, health-play specialists and a children’s behavioural psychologist.

Use your phone, hand-held tablet or google cardboard compatible headset for an interactive immersive 360-degree experience. Users can ‘visit’ the day case ward, anaesthetic and recovery rooms; as they do so, they are introduced to animated characters of hospital staff who explain what will happen in each area, about the equipment that will be used there and how children might feel. The preparatory tool follows a pre-set storyline reflecting what will happen on the day of surgery and takes approximately 10-15 minutes to complete; but, children can explore the hospital as many times as they’d like before they come for surgery.

When you first log in, you are asked to enter an access code. If the hospital where your operation is occurring have uploaded their environments to the app, you can explore the actual rooms you’ll visit on the day of surgery. If you haven’t been provided with an access code, please contact the hospital where you are having your operation.

Children then select the hospital characters they want to show them around the virtual environments; these characters have been developed to match the preferred animation styles of the age groups 3-7 and 8-12, but children can select whichever they prefer. They are able to progress through the virtual environments as they would on the day of surgery or select individual scenes to watch. Children can control the pace of the information and the speed they progress through each area. They trigger the animated characters to play by selecting them. This can be through a simple touch in hand-held tablet mode or through head-tracking technology in virtual reality mode.

We suggest the app is used in the weeks leading up to their surgery, allowing them time to process the information provided. It can be used together with parents or family members and should be used as many times as they wish.

Through improved preparation of children for surgery through use of the Little Journey app - all while in the childs' home - the tool aims to improve their experience of hospital and lower any anxieties about coming to hospital.

Little Journey

Little Journey is an interactive, virtual reality (VR) app designed to prepare children aged 3 to 12 years old for day-case surgery

iPhone 스크린샷

다운로드 Little Journey iPhone 및 iPad용 무료

1단계: Apple Configurator 2 앱을 Mac에 다운로드합니다.

2단계: Apple 계정에 로그인합니다.

3단계: Little Journey IPA 파일.