Virtual reality hypnotherapy for healthcare students: a feasibility trial
Mental Health and Digital Technologies
ISSN: 2976-8756
Article publication date: 12 September 2024
Issue publication date: 23 October 2024
Abstract
Purpose
There is evidence that both hypnotherapy and virtual reality (VR) can be helpful in reducing perceived stress in the general population. This is a feasibility and acceptability trial of an intervention combining hypnotherapy and VR to establish its acceptability in students. This study aims to establish whether students found the experience acceptable, described any adverse effects and whether they reported feeling calmer after the experience.
Design/methodology/approach
The study was testing the hypothesis that students would attend the sessions and find the experience acceptable. A secondary hypothesis was that preliminary qualitative and quantitative evaluation of measures of stress and wellbeing would signal potential improvements.
Findings
All participants completed all three sessions. No side effects were reported. Visual analogue scales recorded each day assessing the immediate effect improved. At the end of the intervention, there was an increase in wellbeing of 2.40 (95% CI: 1.33, 3.53, p = 0.006), and a decrease in depression of 0.73 (95% CI: 0.40, 1.07, p = 0.010), reflecting large effect sizes of 0.76 and 0.83, respectively. Qualitative feedback was generally very positive.
Research limitations/implications
This study is small with just 15 students and was over a short period of time. The recruitment method meant there was no way to establish whether the volunteer students were representative of the general student population in terms of mental wellbeing. There was no control arm.
Practical implications
The preliminary results suggest that a larger controlled trial is justified.
Social implications
This VR experience may have benefit to university students and to the wider population.
Originality/value
This described the evaluation of a novel intervention for perceived stress combining hypnotherapy and virtual reality in a group of healthcare students, with promising results suggesting further evaluation is needed.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The St George’s Student Union allowed the student space to be used and aided with recruitment. Zillah Watson and Ursula James developed the virtual reality application.
Declarations:
Funding: The authors did not receive financial support from any organisation for the submitted work.
Ethics approval and consent to participate: The study was granted approval by the St George’s University of London Ethics Committee and all subjects gave written consent to participate.
Consent for publication: Not applicable.
Data availability: The data sets generated during this study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
Competing interests: The authors have no relevant financial interests to disclose. Dr O’Brien acts as unpaid clinical advisor to the company (Phasespace) developing the VR hypnotherapy experience. Individual student data was not shared with Phasespace and they had no part in the data analysis.
Authors’ contributions: A.A.O’B., S.W., J.H. and S.R. designed the study. A.A.O’B., D.B., N.B.F, J.R. and M.A. conducted the trial. A.A.O’B., J.H., S.W. and J.S. analysed and interpreted the data. All authors contributed to, read and approved the final manuscript.
Citation
O’Brien, A., Hutchinson, J., Bin Fauzi, N., Abbott, M., Railton, J., Bell, D., White, S., Smith, J. and Riches, S. (2024), "Virtual reality hypnotherapy for healthcare students: a feasibility trial", Mental Health and Digital Technologies, Vol. 1 No. 2, pp. 160-172. https://doi.org/10.1108/MHDT-01-2024-0005
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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