Enhancing The Patient Experience With VR

Written by: Arik Yates PTA

“Creativity is intelligence having fun” - Albert Einstein

In therapy, a huge pain point that I have always heard, especially for patients who have gone through the cycle more than once, is waning motivation. On the opposite side of things, spicing up therapy can be an equally difficult thing for the therapist. We have a specific set of goals we need to address and they are not described with colorful verbiage; it's cut and dry. For goals simply stating to increase a certain manual muscle test, or functional range of motion,the first thing that comes to my mind is simple strengthening and stretching. But, does the way we execute activities to address goals have to be cut and dry?

This question was constantly floating around in my head with each new patient that I would see. I first began to address this question by trying to work on ankle and hip strategy strengthening by combining weighted rods (held at 90deg of shoulder flexion) with an inverted bosu and terra core to mimic water skiing, wakeboarding, etc… Another instance was for patients who had sitting balance goals (SCI/misc neuro) I would toss foam balls slightly outside of that reach in all appropriate planes and have the patient try to hit them out of the air with their hands and then also with weighted rods in their hands.

These exercises were great and my patients would end up having a blast while also feeling well challenged. One of the setbacks of these creative exercises, and many that I am sure you may have done, is the long set up time, clean up time, and the amount of tools that were being combined. This left me less time for documentation and sometimes even going over the allotted time I had with them that day. That was when I was introduced to Neuro Rehab VR and their XR Therapy System. Many of the exercises that I was crafting and spending time setting up could be simulated within their system and I could adapt each exercise for w/c, sitting at the edge of the mat, or even standing in a matter of seconds. The sheer amount of time I was able to save gave me a minimum of 10 minutes extra per patient to document, get extra reps in, or just simply allow for a cool down before my next patient. This therapeutic tool definitely improved my work efficiency, but what about on the patients end. If you have read my blogs before, you more than likely already know what this answer is going to be.

The patient's experience, solely based on their quality of movement, is nothing short of stellar. The depth of squats, functional reach outside of their base of support (from sitting and standing), and improvements in gait mechanics post VR convinced me of this tool's effectiveness.  When asked about their experience, their response reciprocated my assumptions based on their movement; they loved it. The sheer shock of realizing what the patient had just done gave them newfound hope in achieving their goals which was reflected in carryover of movements from VR into their activities of daily living. Other patients reported that this had spiced up therapy in ways they did not imagine, and would ask if they could do it the next session. One particular story stands out. A few weeks back a chronic TBI patient had standing frame goals to help promote bowel/bladder control, bone health and joint integrity, and weight bearing to decrease lower extremity tone. After some priming activities, we got them into the standing frame, and I got the idea of using the XR Therapy system to promote relaxation and even possibly anxiety that he may not be able to express. After donning the headset I had his caregiver pay close attention to any signs of discomfort or intolerance. Their reports were quite contrary; they noticed decreased upper extremity tone and better head up posture with less assistance. I had already known of VRs benefits, but seeing how it could even be used to address a standing frame goal further solidified my faith in this tool as much as it did the patient/caregiver in the outlook of their therapy future. 

If you are like me and always on the prowl for ways to help improve the patient experience within treatments and thinking outside the box; I cannot recommend enough trying virtual reality. It has the potential to remove lengthy set up times which gives you more time to focus on the patient, documentation, or even just provide you with time to recover before your next treatment. Lastly, this tool can help breathe new life into your patient treatments by offering a unique approach for promoting patient recovery. To learn more, visit https://www.neurorehabvr.com/xrtherapysystem, to learn more about the system mentioned in this post and even schedule a demo for a deeper dive into the system. You won’t regret it.