The DREAMS Project: Improving the Intensive Care Patient Experience with Virtual Reality
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Background: Patients undergoing critical care can experience negative outcomes due to a variety of causes such as lack of sleep, prolonged pain, and anxiety. Our goal was to evaluate the feasibility and efficacy of using meditative virtual reality (VR) to improve the hospital experience of intensive care unit (ICU) patients. Methods: A Google Daydream headset was used to expose ICU patients to commercially available VR applications focused on calmness and relaxation (Google Spotlight Stories and RelaxVR). Sessions were conducted once daily for up to seven days. Outcome measures including pain level, anxiety, depression, medication administration, sleep quality, heart rate, respiratory rate, blood pressure, delirium status, and patient ratings of the VR system were evaluated using paired t-tests and mixed models where appropriate. Results: 46 participants (M = 50 years, SD = 18) completed the study. The clinical effects of VR were minimal for pain, sleep, and physiological measures. Delirium prevalence after VR exposure was low (13 participants had strong positive reactions to the VR exposure and showed considerable improvements in affect over time. Conclusion: The initial feasibility of exposing patients to VR in ICU was demonstrated. The lessons learned from deploying VR in the ICU are discussed and future avenues of research on the use of VR in the ICU are identified. Trial registration: The trial was registered on December 29, 2017 with ClinicalTrials.gov with the identifier: NCT03385993.
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