Virtual Reality-Augmented Physiotherapy for Chronic Pain in Youth: Protocol for a Randomized Controlled Trial Enhanced With a Single-Case Experimental Design

Abstract

Background: Chronic musculoskeletal (MSK) pain is a prominent health concern, resulting in pain-related disability, loss of functioning, and high health care costs. Physiotherapy rehabilitation is a gold-standard treatment for improving functioning in youth with chronic MSK pain. However, increasing physical activity can feel unattainable for many adolescents because of pain-related fear and movement avoidance. Virtual reality (VR) offers an immersive experience that can interrupt the fear-avoidance cycle and improve engagement in physiotherapy. Despite promising initial findings, data are limited and often lack the rigor required to establish VR as an evidence-based treatment for MSK pain.

Objective: This trial evaluates physiorehabilitation with VR in adolescents with MSK pain. This protocol outlines the rationale, design, and implementation of a randomized controlled trial enhanced with a single-case experimental design.

Methods: This study is a 2-group randomized controlled trial assessing the use of physiorehabilitation with VR in adolescents with MSK pain. The authors will collaborate with physical therapists to integrate VR into their standard clinical care. For participants enrolled in standard physiotherapy, there will be no VR integrated into their physical therapy program. Primary outcomes include physical function and engagement in VR. Secondary outcomes include pain-related fear and treatment adherence. Moreover, we will obtain clinician perspectives regarding the feasibility of integrating the intervention into the flow of clinical practice.

Results: The pilot study implementing physiorehabilitation with VR demonstrated that high engagement and use of physiorehabilitation with VR were associated with improvements in pain, fear, avoidance, and function. Coupled with qualitative feedback from patients, families, and clinicians, the pilot study results provide support for this trial to evaluate physiorehabilitation with VR for youth with chronic MSK pain. Analysis of results from the main clinical trial will begin as recruitment progresses, and results are expected in early 2024.

Conclusions: Significant breakthroughs for treating MSK pain require mechanistically informed innovative approaches. Physiorehabilitation with VR provides exposure to progressive challenges, real-time feedback, and reinforcement for movement and can include activities that are difficult to achieve in the real world. It has the added benefit of sustaining patient motivation and adherence while enabling clinicians to use objective benchmarks to influence progression. These findings will inform the decision of whether to proceed with a hybrid effectiveness-dissemination trial of physiorehabilitation with VR, serving as the basis for potential large-scale implementation of physiorehabilitation with VR.

Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT04636177; https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04636177.

International registered report identifier (irrid): DERR1-10.2196/40705.

Keywords: adolescents; chronic pain; mobile phone; physiotherapy; single-case experimental design; virtual reality.

Figure 1

Study flow depicting eligibility, consent, baseline, discharge, and 3-month follow time points. DD: daily diary; PT: physiotherapy; VR: virtual reality.

Figure 2

Oculus analytics dashboard via ManageXR software (Mighty Immersion, Inc) capturing virtual reality engagement.

Figure 3

ViFive (ViFive, Inc) app screen showing 2 assessments delivered and captured by ViFive.