SynthesisFrontiers in medicine2025
Virtual reality for the management of musculoskeletal pain: an umbrella review.
Synthesis in Frontiers in medicine, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. It is linked to trial NCT07592156 (Efficacy of Immersive Virtual Reality Compared With Conventional Physiotherapy in the Management of Shoulder Tendinopathy), which is not on this map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Efficacy of Immersive Virtual Reality Compared With Conventional Physiotherapy in the Management of Shoulder Tendinopathy: A Randomized Controlled Pilot Study
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Background: Musculoskeletal pain (MSK) is a condition that affects multiple parts of the musculoskeletal system, including limbs, neck, and back, leading to deterioration in both mental and physical health and overall quality of life. Despite the available treatments, they are not considered effective enough to eradicate pain symptoms, thereby requiring new methods as a substitute. This review comprehensively summarizes virtual reality (VR) technology as an adjunct or an alternative treatment for MSK pain and aims to explore the most suitable conditions and settings of VR. Methods: Pubmed, Scopus, and Cochrane databases were searched for recent systematic reviews and meta-analyses investigating VR and MSK pain. The search was performed according to PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) guidelines and revealed 17 relevant articles. The AMSTAR-2 (A MeaSurement Tool to Assess systematic Reviews) analysis was conducted to assess the quality of included studies. The Corrected Covered Area was calculated to identify the degree of overlap. Results: The results found significant pain reduction and mental and physical improvements in patients with MSK pain in comparison to standard therapies in treating neck, knee, and back pain. Nevertheless, the heterogeneity and inconsistencies in results among papers were recognized. The promising aspects are multimodality, namely, VR in combination with exercises, patient acceptance of VR, and the effectiveness of immersive, non-immersive, and gamified versions. These findings also revealed the need for more research on underexplored regions, standardized methodologies, and personalized approaches. Conclusion: To summarize, VR poses the potential to treat MSK pain as an adjunct, and future research is recommended to focus on improving methodological rigor and multimodal approaches. Systematic review registration: OSF (https://osf.io/uyc7z).
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.