Virtual Reality Sessions for Cancer Pain Relief: Groundbreaking Study Published in Cancer Magazine

A new study (http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/cncr.35282) by doctors at Georgetown University School of Medicine and MedStar Health (USA) shows that a 10-minute virtual reality (VR) session reduces significant pain. In hospitalized cancer patients. Even after one day of administration, participants felt the benefits.

As the authors of the publication explain, most people with oncological diseases experience severe pain. The usual treatment for it involves strong drugs such as opioids.

Virtual reality sessions, which allow “immersion” in a different environment, have previously been shown to be an effective, albeit completely non-surgical and non-pharmacological, method for reducing pain in various patient groups. However, there is no data yet on people with cancer.

To investigate, doctors randomly divided 128 adults with cancer and moderate to severe pain into two groups. One completed a 10-minute immersive virtual reality intervention depicting a calm and pleasant environment; The second – a 10-minute session to watch a 2D presentation on a tablet.

It turned out that although both interventions led to a reduction in pain, the effect after the virtual reality sessions was much better. In the tablet group, the average reduction in pain intensity was 0.7 points, while in the virtual reality group – 1.4 points. Twenty-four hours after the session, participants in the virtual reality group were still experiencing pain at a lower level than before the intervention. The same patients also reported improvements in pain “bothers” (how much the pain bothers them, regardless of intensity) and overall distress and expressed satisfaction with the intervention.

“The results of our study suggest that immersive virtual reality can be an effective, non-medical strategy to improve the quality of life of people with cancer pain – summarize the authors of the publication – Although we did it among hospitalized patients In the future, we should let’s also focus on evaluating outpatient VR therapy and investigating the effects of different VR contents, different pain types, and different patient groups.

“Maybe one day, doctors will prescribe such treatments for people with bunion pain to use at home, in addition to usual treatment strategies such as pain relievers,” he adds.

Katarzyna Cehovici

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