Integration of Game Engine Based Mobile Augmented Reality Into a Learning Management System for Online Continuing Medical Education

Abstract

Physicians must participate in continuing medical education (CME) as part of the medical quality assurance. One possibility is to take online courses in their private living environment. These courses are mostly text-or video-based. Novel technologies such as mobile Augmented (AR) or mobile Virtual Reality (VR) are not yet established although their usage is not out of bounds in private homes anymore. Game engines can facilitate the authoring of applications that utilize VR/AR, as they provide many crucial functionalities out of the box. However, integrating the resulting VR/AR software in online CME courses is not trivial. In this paper, we investigate this integration into an existing learning management system (LMS) for online CME. In the example of a mobile AR application, we propose a system design that extends a course by a mobile AR part. We describe our implementation and how we transition users from their familiar web-interface on the desktop PC to a mobile AR application.