NCT05888142

Using Immersive Virtual Reality to Treat Complex Regional Pain Syndrome in Adults

Exploring the Role of Immersive Virtual Reality in Managing Upper-limb Complex Regional Pain Syndrome in Adults

• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 7 (actual)
• Sponsor: University of Washington · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 18 Years – 85 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Not accepted

Summary

This study is designed to test if the use of virtual reality (VR) can improve chronic pain related to CRPS. One way is to use virtual reality. Virtual reality involves looking into a set of goggles and interacting with a computer-simulated world. The use of VR has been shown to be an effective treatment for other pain conditions (Hoffman et al., 2019) and is inexpensive and noninvasive.

Detailed description

Participants will "go into" simple fun pain distracting virtual reality worlds (no previous video game experience needed) that encourages physical movement of the injured limb (e.g., their injured hand). They will also learn some simple daily 10 minute stress reduction, mood lifting mindfulness skills in VR and will receive audio instructions to focus their attention on the sights and sounds, and controlled breathing (Flores et al., 2019).

Conditions

• Pain, Chronic

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
BEHAVIORAL	in clinic pain VR reduction exercises	During the in clinic training phase, participants will use commercially available VR during "in clinic" VR physical therapy exercises, to help reduce their pain and improve functionality. But this group will not take a VR system home until after completing the in clinic training phase.
BEHAVIORAL	In clinic VRpain reduction exercises + VR homeworks	During the training phase, participants will use commercially available VR during "in clinic" physical therapy exercises, and during the training phase, they will also receive a VR system they take home and will begin VR homeworks during the traininng phase, to help reduce their pain and improve functionality.

Timeline

• Start date: 2022-09-16
• Primary completion: 2024-08-03
• Completion: 2024-08-03
• First posted: 2023-06-05
• Last updated: 2024-12-06

Locations

1 site across 1 country: United States