Immersive Virtual Environments and Wearable Haptic Devices in rehabilitation of children with neuromotor impairments: a single-blind randomized controlled crossover pilot study.
Ilaria Bortone, Michele Barsotti, Daniele Leonardis and 4 others
PMID 33115487WHAT IT FOUND
In children with cerebral palsy or developmental dyspraxia, immersive virtual reality with haptic feedback did not show better hand-function test results than conventional therapy.
Some movement smoothness measures favoured virtual reality, but the trial was very small.
Key findings
01No significant difference emerged between virtual reality and conventional therapy for the right-hand nine-hole peg test, and no significant difference was found between periods and treatments in the unified clinical index.
02For linear path tracking, virtual reality was more effective than conventional therapy in improving the smoothness index regardless of period.
03When Period 1 results were aggregated across treatments, the nine-hole peg test, velocity weighted error, and smoothness improved significantly, but the unified clinical index did not.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for PTsWhat it means for OTs
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What it does not show
Only eight children were enrolled, and no power analysis was performed, so the study is too small to detect or rule out meaningful differences. The crossover design could not separate carry-over effects from sequence effects, and the four-week wash-out may have been too short. The long-term effects were not evaluated. Motivation was not measured, although it may affect adherence. The unified clinical index did not improve, while movement tracking measures did, so transfer to everyday hand function is unclear. Head and trunk compensation were not analysed, and no restraint was used to prevent compensatory movements.
Declared interests
The work was funded by Project TELOS. The supplied text does not state author competing-interest declarations.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that virtual reality with haptic devices is proven better for daily hand function. The main functional comparisons were not significant, the unified clinical index did not improve, and only eight children were studied.