Feasibility of a Cinematic-Virtual Reality Program Educating Health Professional Students about the Complexity of Geriatric Care: A Pilot Study (Preprint)

Abstract

The United States population is aging. With this demographic shift, more older adults will be living with chronic conditions and geriatric syndromes. To prepare the next generation of health care professionals for this aging population, we need to provide training that captures the complexity of geriatric care.

The aim of this pilot study was to assess the feasibility of the cinematic virtual reality (cine-VR) training in the complexity of geriatric care. We measured changes in attitudes to disability, self-efficacy to identify and manage elder abuse and neglect, and empathy before and after participating in the training program.

We conducted a single arm, pre-test and post-test pilot study to assess the feasibility of a cine-VR training and measure changes in attitudes to disability, self-efficacy to identify and manage elder abuse and neglect, and empathy. Health professional students from a large university in the Midwest were invited to participate in one of four cine-VR trainings. Participants completed three surveys before and after the cine-VR training. We performed paired t-tests to examine changes in these constructs before and after the training.

A total of 65 health professional students participated in and completed the full cine-VR training for 100% retention. Participants did not report any technological difficulties or adverse effects from wearing the head-mounted displays or viewing the 360-degree video. Of the 65 participants, 48 completed the pre- and post-assessments. We observed an increase in awareness of discrimination towards people with disability (t.05,47= -3.967, P<.001). Additionally, we observed significant improvements in self-efficacy to identify and manage elder abuse and neglect (t.05,47= -3.364, P=.002). Lastly, we observed an increase in participants’ empathy (t.05,47= -2.329, P=.024).

We demonstrated that our cine-VR training program was feasible and acceptable to health professional students at our Midwestern university. Findings suggest that the cine-VR training increased awareness of discrimination towards people with disabilities, improved self-efficacy to identify and manage elder abuse and neglect, and increased empathy. Future research utilizing a randomized control trial design with a larger, more diverse sample and a proper control condition is needed to confirm the effectiveness of our cine-VR training.

Not applicable