Virtual Reality in Nursing over the Past Ten Years: An Umbrel-la Review of Meta-Analyses (Preprint)

Abstract

BACKGROUND VR has shown promising levels of effectiveness in various scenarios, such as nursing education, pain management and rehabilitation. Current meta-analyses have discussed the effects of VR usage in nursing unilaterally and inconsistently, and the evidence base is diffuse and varied. OBJECTIVE This umbrella review aimed to synthesize the combined evidence from meta-analyses assessing the effects of nurses using virtual reality technology on nursing educations or patient health outcome. METHODS We conducted an umbrella review by searching Web of Science, Embase, Cochrane, PubMed and the reference lists of relevant studies. Eligible reviews published between 1 December 2012 and 1 December 2022. Appraised the quality of reviews using the AMSTAR and the GRADE Checklist for Systematic Reviews and meta-analysis. RESULTS 63 meta-analyses were included. The most VR study conditions were neuronursing(33%), neo-natal(26%), gerontic(8%), oncological(6%),wound care(5%) and nursing education(8%), and the problems expected to solve were pain(17%),anxiety(15%),motor(12%) and cognitive(8%) function and depression(7%).VR treatment on cognitive function, pain and depression is effective in neu-rological, neonatal, chronic & aging, breast cancer and wound patients, while it is controversial on anxiety for education and carcinoma other than breast cancer. Symptoms of adverse event were reported mainly including nausea, vomiting, dizziness. The prevalence of adverse reac-tions ranged from 4.76%-50% where VR interventions were used. Most of these meta-analyses are meta-analyses of randomized controlled trials. Approximately 61% were rated as very low, 27% as low, and 9% as moderate on the GRADE scale. CONCLUSIONS VR in nursing has a positive effect on relieving patients' anxiety and pain and improving cognitive function; The application of nursing VR in nursing education and improve patients' motor function, memory and attention is still controversial. Nursing researchers need to further explore the effect of VR on anxiety, pain, cognitive impairment and rehabilitation training, promote the clinical application of VR technology with practical clinical significance, and judge the trade-off between the actual benefits of VR use to patients and the human cost of VR equipment development costs, and more high-quality nursing VR articles are needed.