Helping All Stakeholders Empower Children with Type 1 Diabetes Using Kid-driven, Game-based Learning

Heroic Diabetes has been invited to present at the American Diabetes Assoc Innovation Challenge in June & will be officially launching its educational platform

BOISE, ID, UNITED STATES, May 8, 2024 /EINPresswire.com/ -- Diabetes is an expensive and debilitating problem facing the United States, and it is only getting worse. Heroic Diabetes is launching its educational platform using the Heroic Game Day skills learning platform for K-6 students that engages kids in learning how to live their life adventure, in spite of their challenges. This not only improves kids' lives, but also helps their families, their communities and the health companies, practitioners and caregivers that assist them throughout their lives.

Resources for the 244,000 children living with Type 1 Diabetes (T1D) in America are scarce and the consequences severe.

Unfortunately, these young patients are at risk for a lifetime of repeated hospital visits, secondary diseases, and increased rates of depression. Without innovative resources to address the increasing rate of T1D diagnosis, healthcare professionals and affected families will face the task of supporting these children in emergent situations on a national scale for years to come.

Diabetes is the single most expensive chronic condition in our nation! Throughout the lifespan, diabetics pay an estimated 2.3 times more in healthcare costs than non-diabetics. Without accounting for insurance assistance, an average of $16,750 of total diabetic medical expenses is incurred every year per patient with $9,600 being directly attributable to diabetes and its secondary complications, which include kidney failure, neuropathy, retinopathy/blindness, heart disease, peripheral arterial disease, stroke, hearing loss, and foot ulcers/amputations.

Type 1 Diabetes contributes to these numbers, and is currently an incurable disease.

The estimated total cost of diagnosed diabetes in 2017 was $327 billion, with $237 billion from direct medical costs and $90 billion in reduced productivity, including premature deaths. Worse yet, rates of newly diagnosed youth with T1D have increased significantly since Covid-19.

In addition to the financial burden, the suffering incurred by young diabetics and their families is also significant.

One in every five parents of children with T1D report clinically significant distress, anxiety, depression, and PTSD.

The children themselves also report increased rates of depression.

“The good news for the financial and individual suffering from diabetes is that day-to-day health concerns and secondary diseases can be prevented through proper treatment and education, which is already available. The gap between patients and behavioral change must be addressed through effective educational efforts,” states Jaren Smith, Director and Kid’s Advocate for the Heroic Diabetes project. “Early education for this vulnerable population is financially justified by significantly reducing secondary disease processes from developing.”

“The Heroic Diabetes project is a scalable video game platform to facilitate self-motivated learning in school-aged children. By playing the game, kids will be learning the basics of diabetes, including how to engage in their own care plans, and decreasing the burden being placed on healthcare providers or parents,” states Scott Dow, CEO of Heroic Game Day, “Our intent is to supplement what the kids already have - not replace. So regardless of what support the child is getting or not getting - we can help.”

The Game’s Purpose and Theme:

Purpose: To empower children with Type 1 DM through effective kid-driven education and to provide meaningful resources for affected families.

Theme: Learning how to manage diabetes lets you live your full adventure!

The Game’s Learning Objectives:

Pathophysiology: Children will understand the cause and consequences of T1D.

Nutrition: Children will understand principles of nutrition in the context of T1D.

Treatment: Children will identify methods of insulin administration, glucose monitoring,b important symptoms to communicate to adults, and considerations for safe exercise.

Coping: Children will be provided with methods for coping with chronic illness while being involved with a safe online community of fellow children with T1D.

The children are immersed in a game-based experiential learning environment where they want to learn, level up and progress through the game, and in doing so, they learn the critical skills they need to manage their disease - all without the need for a caregiver to teach them!

The Heroic Diabetes platform is hugely scalable; the game is the same for 1 child as it is for ten million children.

Partners become subject matter experts as they work with the Heroic Diabetes game-based learning teams to create the content that drives the engagement and learning for the kids and parents.

Heroic Diabetes calls on all stakeholders in the fight to not only find the cure, but also alleviate the unnecessary suffering of these kids.

About Heroic Game Day (www.heroicgameday.com)

Heroic Game Day complements traditional public and private schools as a “bolt-on” supplement that delivers academic, social, and healthy deliverables to schools while maintaining their autonomy. It has been in the making for the past decade, using technology (game-based learning, data-driven intelligence, and blockchain) to connect, engage, and deliver world-leading academic, social, and health results that will help retain America’s leadership position in the world. This is an extremely scalable and effective education system. We already know if a student spends 30 mins per day in the game, they will not only become proficient in the Top 20 critical life skills, but they will also become proficient at their math and reading state tests. Now, this tool is available for the diabetic youth community.

Scott Dow
Heroic Game Day
+1 202-876-8144
email us here