Clinical trial · Interventional
Virtual Reality as an Adjunct to Management of Pain and Anxiety in Palliative Care
- Source
- ClinicalTrials.gov
- Retrieved
- Sep 8, 2026
- Layer
- normalized (units and labels harmonized; values unchanged)
- Run
- ING-CLINICALTRIALS-20260908-000001
Summary
Brief summary (as posted)
Virtual reality has been shown to be an effective way to treat pain and anxiety in various different settings. Palliative care is an area of medicine that often deals with patients suffering from pain and anxiety. The medication used to manage these symptoms are often opioids and benzodiazepines due to their rapid onset however they do have a significant side effect burden on patients. Very few studies have looked at the effect of virtual reality in this patient population. The goal of this study is to measure if virtual reality can decrease the required amount of medication used in managing pain and anxiety in palliative care. The secondary outcome will look at perceived benefit by patients
Conditions
Conditions (4)
Free-text conditions as registered, with the CancerIndex entity they were reconciled to and the match type.
| Condition (as posted) | Mapped entity | Match | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| ALS | — | UNRESOLVED | — |
| Cancer | Malignant Neoplasm | ALIAS | 0.90 |
| Copd | — | UNRESOLVED | — |
| Heart Failure | — | UNRESOLVED | — |
Interventions
Interventions (1)
| Intervention | Type | Mapped drug | Match |
|---|---|---|---|
| Virtual Reality | Device | — | UNRESOLVED |
Design
Arms and outcomes
Arms (1)
- type
- OTHER
- label
- Virtual Reality
- description
- As this is a within subject design, participants will act as their own control. Participants will have access to their baseline opioids and benzodiazepines for pain and anxiety. Every second day they will have access to virtual reality as an adjunct to their opioids and benzodiazepines to manage their symptoms
- interventionNames
- Device: Virtual Reality
Primary outcomes (1)
- measure
- Opioid and Benzodiazepine use
- timeFrame
- 10 days
- description
- Number of additional doses of opioids and benzodiazepines used on standard of care days will be compared to additional doses of opioids and benzodiazepines used on standard of care and virtual reality days
Secondary outcomes (1)
- measure
- Patient perception of benefit
Eligibility
Eligibility (as posted)
- Sex
- All
Show eligibility criteria text
Inclusion Criteria: * Enrolled on the palliative care program and admitted to Riverview Health Centre Palliative Care unit * Using 2 or more doses above their regular scheduled dose of opioids and/or benzodiazepines * Reading/understanding fluency in English Exclusion Criteria: * Patients who cannot wear the headset due to a structural cause (i.e. head and neck malignancy making wearing headset uncomfortable * Patients who are legally blind * Participants who cannot tolerate the HMD and VR due to simulator sickness will have to be withdrawn from the study by the investigator.
References
Publications (0)
Data not yet available