DA10--Intent to Sole Source XRtistry software app support. for Cleveland VAMC

The Veteran s Administration (VA) Office of Research and Development, Regional Procurement Office East in Pittsburgh, PA intends to negotiate on a sole source basis with XRtistry LLC based in Amherst, Ohio on behalf of the Louis Stokes VA Cleveland Medical Center (LSCVAMC) located in Cleveland, OH.

Multiple virtual-reality (VR) therapeutic games have been developed to treat vision and vestibular disorders, as part of two research projects funded by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA Rehabilitation Research and Development (RR&D) Small Projects in Rehabilitation Research (SPiRE) grant numbers: I21RX002892, entitled Computerized game-based vestibular rehabilitation: assessment of feasibility and motor learning; and I21RX003750, entitled Virtual-reality assessment and treatment of binocular vision impairment in traumatic brain injury. This technology is covered in the US Patent Office application 18/056,249, Nov 16, 2022, entitled Methods and Systems for Dynamic Ocular Training Using Therapeutic Games. The task for this contract is to provide an application based on these games that is appropriate for home therapy use. The refinement includes improving the appearance of video game visual and sound elements, as well as improving the user interface to be more engaging for patients and more intuitive for clinicians who are administering the video game as therapy.

Scope: This work will be performed in consultation with a VA research team at the Ocular Motility Lab of the LSCVAMC. The scope includes providing a home rehabilitation application incorporating the therapy games that the VA research team has developed. The work will include new user interfaces for individual games and the overall application, improved sound effects and refined game assets, an intuitive settings menu for therapy clinicians, appropriate log files to document patient use and performance, and a flexible design that will allow the application to be compatible with multiple VR headsets.

Specific Tasks.

Task 1: User Experience Exploration

Subtask 1.1: Review current experience design with clinicians to assess what refinements are possible and necessary.

Subtask 1.2: Define user experience map and feature implementation roadmap.

Subtask 1.3: Research and planning for specific changes therapists intend to make during progression of therapy.

Task 2: Game Integration and configuration

Subtask 2.1: Implement a new VR hub for patients to choose from the available games following their therapist-set rehabilitation schedule.

Subtask 2.2: Update the programming of the individual games to allow the needed parameters to be controlled from the clinician settings panel.

Subtask 2.3: Implement a settings menu that will allow clinicians the ability to set use of eyes, amount of head rotation, distance from the target, game difficulty and other configurable settings. Clinician settings menu will have the ability to schedule changes to parameters over a series of play sessions.

Task 3: Asset refinement and creation

Subtask 3.1 Refinement and testing of user experience to ease new patient onboarding.

Subtask 3.2 User experience and user interface design process resulting in co-implemented interface assets.

Subtask 3.3 Creating models and or 2D visual elements to finalize the game experiences.

Subtask 3.4 Creating sounds to reflect user interactions, enforce game feedback, and drive patient engagement.

Subtask 3.5 Implement tutorial experiences to teach users how to play the games in a step-by-step manner.

Task 4: Implementation, testing, and refinement

Subtask 4.1 Replacing old game assets with refined assets. Integrating all final assets into the application to increase user engagement, satisfaction, and positive medical outcomes.

Subtask 4.2 Testing and refinement of final game experience for intuitive usability and stability.

The requirement will take place at a VA facility in Cleveland, OH. The sole source is pursuant to FAR 6.302-1 Only One Responsible Source and No Other Supplies or Services Will Satisfy Agency Requirements. This notice of intent is not a request for competitive proposals, however; any responsible source who believes it is capable of meeting the requirement may submit a capability statement and supporting documentation to the contracting office no later than Thursday, April 20, 2023, (10:00 AM, EST). Interest/capability statements may be sent to Michael Haydo at Michael.haydo@va.gov. No telephone responses will be accepted. A determination not to compete the proposed requirement based upon the responses to this notice is solely within the discretion of the Government.