None listed
Conditions
Brief summary
Palliative care patients’ capacity to participate in meaningful activities may be limited and this can negatively impact their quality of life. A personalised Virtual Reality (VR) intervention was trialled in an inpatient palliative care setting to establish the effects of multiple VR sessions on quality of life and symptom burden in patients. The intervention encouraged participants to visit their choice of memorable and desired places. Participants completed three 20-minute VR sessions and the effects of the intervention on symptom burden and quality of life were measured.
Interventions
Three virtual reality sessions of around 20min were conducted over a period of approximately one week. Before the VR sessions, an interview was established meaningful content for participants. Questions explored preferences for places and experiences that participants would like to revisit, as well as music preferences. During the virtual reality sessions participants view the tailored virtual reality content with continual conversation occurring between the participant and researcher. The conte
Three virtual reality sessions of around 20min were conducted over a period of approximately one week. Before the VR sessions, an interview was established meaningful content for participants. Questions explored preferences for places and experiences that participants would like to revisit, as well as music preferences. During the virtual reality sessions participants view the tailored virtual reality content with continual conversation occurring between the participant and researcher. The content was delivered using the Oculus Quest 2 headset. The VR experiences enabled participants to explore photorealistic global environments. Destinations spanned geographical points of personal interest, including famous landmarks (e.g. London Bridge, Great Pyramids). When exploring the VR experiences, they were asked to share their impressions and memories with the researcher. To prevent possible triggering of distressing memories or experiences, participants were asked to focus only on positive memories during the session and in the interview. The researchers kept records of the content provided and time in VR,
Sponsors
Tobias Loetscher
Study design
Allocation
Non-randomised trial
Intervention model
Single group
Primary purpose
Treatment
Masking
Open (masking not used)
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
All
Age
18 Years to No maximum
Healthy volunteers
No
Inclusion criteria
Inpatient male or female receiving palliative care and over the age of 18. Proficient English speakers. Able to tolerate wearing the head-mounted display and have vision that can be corrected with the use of their current glasses. Willing to undertake multiple assessments.
Exclusion criteria
Significant neurological disorders or psychotic disorders that would affect the ability to perform assessments. Those that have issues with confusion/disorientation at a level that would affect the ability to differentiate between virtual reality and the real world, or who may become distressed due to confusion re time and place
Outcome results
None listed