Student upgraded to fair condition

Freshman Ashley Lee has been upgraded from critical to fair condition almost two weeks after contracting bacterial meningitis, said John Mills, the public affairs manager at Methodist Hospital in Indianapolis.\n"If another case comes up now it will be unrelated to (Lee's)," said Dr. Hugh Jessop, director of the IU Health Center. "Ten days from exposure is the most contagious time, and we are four or five days out of that."\nThe upgrade came the same day as the announcement of a computer game created by the IU-Purdue University at Indianapolis School of Informatics, which informs incoming college students of the dangers of the disease.\n"We opted for a less frightening approach, smart aleck and tongue-in-cheek," said project leader and scriptwriter Barbara Hayes, "but one that we hope (gets) past the normal feelings of invincibility that most young people have."\nThe game, "Danger in the Dorm," is interactive and leads the player on a two-minute trivia journey through the consequences of meningitis and shows how easily a vaccine can be obtained.\n"The college years are also a time when responsibility for health care passes from the parents to the young adult," Hayes said. "We are urging young adults to take responsibility for their own health care and get the shot."\nThe project began unfunded a couple years ago when Hayes, a visiting professor at the School of Informatics in Indianapolis, was approached by the staff of the Marion County Health Department's Immunization Program. Their goal was to create something to engage students while delivering an important message.\nJeff Hostetler, assistant to the director of the Informatics Research Institute, is one of the video game's narrators and admits he knew very little about bacterial meningitis before beginning his work on the game.\n"I learned that there's an option," Hostetler said. "All you have to do is go get immunized."\nHayes said Lee's contraction of the disease hits close to home since she is a parent herself.\n"My heart goes out to anyone afflicted with this terrible disease," Hayes said. "I was not aware of how rapidly the individual who contracts it gets sick and how deadly it can be. I was not aware that often, when people survive, they suffer some disfigurement. "\nAccording to the National Meningitis Association Web site, www.nmaus.org, nearly 3,000 cases of meningitis are reported every year in the United States and between 10 to 12 percent of cases are fatal. Among those who survive bacterial meningitis, approximately 20 percent suffer long-term consequences, such as brain damage, kidney disease, hearing loss or limb amputations.\nFor now, "Danger in the Dorm" is in the hands of the Marion County Health Department which is looking for funding for mass distribution.\nHostetler said he hopes the game will be an effective measure to reducing the number of meningitis cases.\n"I think many young adults experience a false sense of security with regards to their own health and mortality," he said.