Application of VR360 for Clinical Reasoning Development in Occupational Therapy Students in Handling Complex Behavioural Symptoms in Individuals With Dementia.
Frank Ho-Yin Lai, Ben Chi-Bun Yip, Eddie Yip-Kuen Hai and 1 others
PMID 42153966WHAT IT FOUND
Sixty OT students rated their own clinical reasoning higher after a four-scenario 360° video module on dementia behaviour, but with no control group the gains could come from simply completing the module.
Promising as a training tool, not yet proven to work.
Key findings
01All three CRAT domains improved substantially: content knowledge from 3.40 to 5.41, procedural knowledge from 3.46 to 5.57, and conceptual reasoning from 3.39 to 5.32, with effect sizes of d = 1.94, 2.11, and 2.08.
02Prior dementia care experience was the strongest moderator, with the largest effect on procedural knowledge (partial η² = 0.34), followed by content knowledge (partial η² = 0.24) and conceptual reasoning (partial η² = 0.18).
03The study used a single-group pre-post design with no control group; the authors state an RCT was considered but deemed impractical, and they identify the absence of a randomised control group as a major limitation.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for OTs
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What it does not show
No control group: students could have improved simply by completing the module, attending a briefing, or through concurrent coursework and natural progression over the study period. The outcome was a self-rating scale (CRAT) with no established reliability data in the published literature; students may have over- or under-estimated their abilities. All 60 participants came from a single university, limiting generalisability to other programmes or countries. The VR360 scenarios, while immersive, cannot replicate the unpredictability of real dementia-care settings. The authors themselves describe the findings as preliminary and hypothesis-generating, and call for randomised trials with objective performance measures.
Declared interests
Funded by the Innovation and Technology Fund for Better Living (ITB/FBL/2004/19/P). The authors declare no conflicts of interest.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read the large pre-post score gains as proof the VR360 module improves clinical reasoning. There was no control group, the outcome was a self-rating scale with no established reliability data, and the authors themselves state the findings are preliminary and that randomised trials are needed to establish causal effectiveness.