Dr. Ken Tao’s Reflection on May’s Article

Dr. Ken Tao (00:01):

Hey everyone. I’m Dr. Tao, Director of the Research Scholars Program at MedSchoolCoach. First off, great job getting through this research article. I know these can be dense and hard to read. As a research scientist, I wanted to share with you my thoughts on what this study shows. And, maybe more importantly, what it doesn’t.

This was a randomized crossover trial, which is a strong study design because each person got to try both the virtual reality program and the audio-only program. That means that researchers could compare results from the same person under two different conditions, which helps to reduce bias. The results were also very exciting. The participants reported lower pain, better sleep, improved mood, and reduced anxiety when they used virtual reality compared to the audio-only option.

However, while this study was very exciting, I also had a lot of questions.

Dr. Tao (00:54):

First, can we apply these results more broadly? This is something researchers call “generalizability.” For example, the study focused only on adults with chronic lower back pain, and that’s a very specific group. But these same results hold up for people with different types of pain like migraines or arthritis or post-surgical pain. Would these results also apply to different groups of people such as teenagers, older adults, or people with disabilities?

Another point that I noticed was that all the participants use the virtual reality program at home. That raises questions about access. Not everyone has a VR headset, a quiet space, or even reliable internet. So if the treatment works, who gets to use it, and how can we make sure it’s equitable, that is, available and effective, for all kinds of people?

Another factor to consider is the length of the study. Each person used the virtual reality program for five weeks.

Dr. Tao (01:58):

That’s a good start. But what happens if they use the virtual reality program for a longer period of time? After all, the study is looking at chronic pain. So let’s say they were to continue with this virtual reality program for five months or five years…[do] the benefits last, or do the effects wear off over time? We don’t know yet. And the study, it gives us a great start, but there’s additional research that must be done to know that if the effects persist, or not, over longer periods of time.

Now, I know that I’ve raised a lot of questions for you, and that’s really how research works, right? We start with a question. We perform a study. We obtain results. But based on those results, we come up with additional questions that we ask, and that leads researchers to perform additional studies.

So as part of this, I wanted to leave all of you with a few questions to think about either today, or perhaps in your next discussion. If you were designing a new study or perhaps a follow-up study, what would you change or add? What challenges might doctors have to consider when bringing this kind of treatment to patients and, beyond chronic pain, do you think virtual reality might be useful in healthcare and other aspects such as mental health, physical therapy, or surgery training?

That’s all I have for now. Thanks everyone for your time and hope you all enjoyed this Journal Club experience.