Can Immersive Virtual Reality increase our capacity for providing a better patient experience? Photo by Pixabay user truthseeker08.

Does a path to improved patient experience lie through the use of technology? This is a question on my mind after reading Liberti and Triberati’s (2014) article Patient-centered virtual reality: an opportunity to improve the quality of patient’s experience.

How does this hyped-up new technology link to developing improvements in the care of patients through consideration of their needs and values?

There is considerable evidence to support patient-centered care approaches in healthcare interactions. According to Oates, Weston, and Jordan (2000), patients experiencing patient-centered approaches have “improved health status (less discomfort, less concern, and better mental health) and increased efficiency of care (fewer diagnostic tests and referrals)” (p.800). Several strategic priorities of my health authority would be achieved through a patient-centered approach, including improved population health and reduced care costs. So, how does technology fit into the practice of patient-centeredness?

Immersive Virtual Reality (IVR) has the unique ability to simulate real-world conversations using avatars and virtual patients. This social simulation is a key component in developing improved communication skills for healthcare providers and it can be leveraged to increase their ability to deliver increasingly patient-centered care. According to Triberti and Liberati (2014) technology is demonstrating an ability to assist with practitioner training to facilitate improved interviewing skills. “An essential condition for the key delivery of [patient centered] care consists in cultivating clinicians’ communicational skills, as well as relational and empathic competences.” (Triberti & Liberati, 2014, p. 16). IVR allows us to leverage its affordances of immersion, presence, and flow to push us to the edges of our ability and knowledge.

The benefits of patient-centered care are substantial if patients are involved in shared-decision making at their discretion and open conversations are held about their values and care goals; however, each patient-provider relationship should be considered uniquely (Stewart, 2001). Healthcare approaches that increasingly consider patients in all possible opportunities of healthcare design, planning, and delivery are paralleled in other industries in the form of design-thinking and consideration of the user experience.

It is interesting to note that, as in medicine, a person-centered approach is developing also in the technology field: it is increasingly acknowledged that design must be centered on the person, namely the user. (Triberti & Liberati, 2014, p. 19)

From Vann’s (2017) description of the empathy required in instructional learning design for adult learners, to Crichton and Carter’s (2017) description of why all learners should be design-thinkers, we see the message repeated. The benefits of empathetic and user-centered design are the resulting solutions which are creative, innovative, and potentially capable of solving complex, globalized problems.

…[healthcare] quality guru Donald Berwick reminds, [patient-centered] transformation involves some “radical, unfamiliar and disruptive shifts in control and power, out of the hands of those who give care and into the hands of those who receive it”. (as cited in Triberti & Liberati, 2014, p 8)

If you actively listen to, and consider the needs of, each individual in the process of design, the results speak for themselves. The context appears to be irrelevant. The theme increasingly centered on connection and understanding.

While offering positive benefits of increased empathy, autonomy, collaboration and evocative response, Triberti and Liberati (2014) concede that virtual patients cannot provide conversations as fluid as standardized patients, nor is relationship-building possible. There are current limitations to the humanness and authenticity of IVR avatars, but this may not last long given the rate of technology innovation. What IVR is increasingly great at, is putting healthcare providers in the perspective of the patient and making us realize the impacts of our current system processes and behaviors. Simulations such as Embodies Labs’ (2019) Becoming Alfred is one example. IVR with patient-empathy design acts like a mirror for us to see our care practices from a new perspective.

At present, the large-scale benefits of IVR also include improved patient diversity, reduced costs of training, and higher quality control. Joined with the benefits of developing communication skills, these are reason enough to continue exploring the technology further in healthcare contexts. The result of careful simulation design using sound pedagogy and leveraging IVR technological affordances may continue to create an improved understanding of and connection to our patients.

CB

References:

Crichton, S. & Carter, D. (2017). . Open School/ITA.

Embodies Labs, (2019). [website]. Retrieved from: https://embodiedlabs.com/

Oates, J., Weston, W. W., & Jordan, J. (2000). The impact of patient-centered care on outcomes. The Journal of Family Practice, 49(9), 796-804.