ArticleJournal of medical extended reality2025
Investigating Demographic Barriers Toward Virtual Reality Pain Efficacy in Clinical Trials: An Exploratory Mixed-Methods Study.
Article in Journal of medical extended reality, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the 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.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
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
Abstract
Chronic pain affects over 50 million Americans and is frequently managed with pharmacologic interventions, including opioids, which carry misuse risks. Virtual reality (VR) has emerged as a promising non-pharmacological therapy, yet questions persist about equitable access and whether VR could perpetuate existing health care disparities. This exploratory sequential mixed-methods study investigated barriers and facilitators to VR therapy use in diverse chronic pain populations and examined whether these challenges correlated with changes in Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System (PROMIS) Pain Interference (PROMIS-PI) scores. We recruited 31 participants from two National Institutes of Health-funded trials, utilizing purposive sampling to ensure a broad demographic range regarding race, ethnicity, gender, socioeconomic status, and geographic location. Participants completed one-on-one interviews regarding VR use, which were qualitatively coded and quantified to explore correlations with changes in PROMIS-PI from baseline to week 8. Six themes emerged from the qualitative analysis: apprehension and familiarity, usability and comfort, application and pain, experiences, personal connection, and community beliefs. Most participants reported at least temporary pain relief with VR, citing distraction-based or mindfulness content as beneficial; however, cost, technological literacy, and cultural familiarity were identified as key barriers. Spearman's $\rho$ and point-biserial tests showed no statistically significant relationships between thematic variables or demographics and PROMIS-PI changes. These findings suggest that VR therapy is broadly acceptable and beneficial across diverse patient groups, though cost and cultural apprehension may impede widespread, equitable adoption. Future research should focus on refining VR content for user comfort, expanding technological support, and developing strategies to overcome barriers to access to ensure the therapy's benefits are realized equitably.
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.