Virtual reality: A new dimension in medicine

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Virtual realityCedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles uses virtual reality to help patients reduce pain.

You’ve probably heard of ‘mind over matter’. Some doctors believe this could be the key to unleashing your own healing power.

Now, researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles are trying to help the mind-body healing process, by using VR, or virtual reality. The trial study gives patients VR headsets and immerses them in a world far away from their hospital bed.

Virtual reality: A new dimension in medicine

Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles use virtual reality to help patients with pain.

“When people use it, for the most part, it reduces their pain quite considerably, so within in the course of five minutes the pain will drop from about five-and-a-half points to four points on a ten-point scale,” explained Dr. Brennan Spiegel, the director of Cedars-Sinai Health Services Research. “That’s pretty dramatic for not using any narcotics, no medications, no medical intervention, just the experience of being physically transported away from where you physically are.”

Full Frame contributor Sandra Hughes takes an in-depth look inside this innovation in medical research.