An incredible letter recently made its way to my desk. A woman in Alaska wrote to share a remarkable story, one that reaffirms the brain building (and in some ways even life-saving!) power of play and reminds us that the games we create can do powerful things.
Her letter gave me chills!
This isn’t the first we’ve heard about our games, particularly Rush Hour, being used to treat patients with brain injuries. Over the years we have heard from many therapists who use our games to help patients rebuild cognitive and fine motor skills, and Rush Hour was recently featured in an NBC Nightly News segment on treating returning veterans with brain injuries. We are eager to explore how we can continue to create games that support the incredible work these doctors are doing!
(Check out Rush Hour’s cameo at 00:38)
Are you a therapist or patient who has used games as part of your treatment? Please share your story!
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Now that’s what I’m talking about!!!!!! What a great letter. This is why I love ThinkFun so much and am proud to be part of the team
… because we can help people to help themselves. ThinkFun games are empowering at any age and level…for so many reasons, and this reason is one of the most amazing! How wonderful! 
I had massive bi-lateral pulmonary embolism when I was 15 weeks pregnant and perfectly healthy. The clots caused my heart to stop and my brain to suffer from lack of oxygen. I had several strokes. Six months later, I am going to speech therapy once a week. Rush Hour has helped me “learn” to think again! Thank you for this game. It’s fun too.
Emily,
Thank you so much for sharing this experience – what an incredibly tough journey these past few months have been for you and your family. We are absolutely thrilled to hear that our game could play a role in your therapy, and we wish you all the best for your continued recovery. I would love to hear any insight you have about ways we could reach out to help more people like you – will send you an email and look forward to continuing the conversation!
Best,
Charlotte
I am a cna who cares for a victim of brain trauma. He isn’t able to talk and has limited use of his limbs. What do you suggest would be a therapeutic game for us to play
First, thank you for the amazing work you are doing to support your patients and help with their recovery – kudos to you for seeking out new tools to make the process more engaging and fun! We have heard wonderful things about therapists and physicians using our Rush Hour game with patients who have suffered brain trauma, as this game helps engage planning and sequencing skills while exercising fine motor and critical thinking muscles. Not knowing the extent of your patient’s mobility limitations, this may be a challenge to move small pieces though. Another great spatial game to try is Swish, which is a transparent card game that does require some dexterity to pick up and stack cards, but isn’t as small and fiddly as Rush Hour or our other single player logic games (like Solitaire Chess and Chocolate Fix). Best of luck to you, and please keep me posted on any insights or learnings you have in your use of games!