By Pat Anson, PNN Editor

A new clinical study has found that home-based virtual reality (VR) therapy can significantly reduce pain levels in people suffering from chronic lower back pain. Patients who watched VR programs also reported better mood, reduced stress and that pain interfered less with their sleep.

The study, published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research, is the first controlled trial to compare home-based VR therapy to a “sham” or placebo treatment for chronic pain. The research was funded by AppliedVR, a Los Angeles-based company that is developing therapeutic VR content to help treat pain and other conditions.

Eighty-nine people used the company’s EaseVRx headset daily for eight weeks, immersing themselves in relaxing and meditative VR programs designed to make their pain seem less important, similar to cognitive behavioral therapy. A control group received the sham treatment, watching routine nature scenes with the headset. All participants had chronic low back pain for at least six months.   

By the end of the study, 87 percent of people in the VR group reported less pain intensity, with nearly two-thirds experiencing at least a 30% reduction in pain compared to the control group. There were also significant improvements in sleep, mood and stress in the VR group.

Importantly, the improvements in pain and other symptoms were cumulative over time – meaning the relief was long-lasting and not just when people were watching VR programs.

“If you look at the results graph, you’re able to see the trajectory of pain and pain intensity very reliably declining over the course of the eight weeks. It’s a really strong time trend. It’s not just a random effect,” explained Beth Darnall, PhD, AppliedVR’s chief science advisor.

You can see the graph below. Over the course of 56 days, average pain intensity fell by 43% in patients using the EaseVRx headset, compared to 23% in the control or sham group.

Most of the research to date on VR therapy has focused on treating acute pain in hospitalized patients. AppliedVR is trying to demonstrate that virtual reality can also be used to treat chronic pain at home. A small study released last summer showed that home-based VR therapy reduced pain in people with fibromyalgia and chronic low back pain.

Darnall was hesitant to say if there were any pain conditions that VR therapy might not useful for.

“At the end of the day, pain is pain,” said Darnall, who is a pain psychologist at Stanford University. “This basic approach, in which we’re equipping people with self-regulatory skills, is going to be beneficial and broadly applicable for every pain condition.

“We have multiple studies in progress that are testing this device on different populations. It’s really going to be an exciting year, because there’s going to be an explosion of research that’s really going to inform our understanding of how this may help people across different disease conditions.”   

AppliedVR’s headset received breakthrough device designation from the Food and Drug Administration last year. The company hopes to get clearance from the FDA later this year to begin selling the devices. Due to a recent decision by Medicare to start covering breakthrough medical devices, the company is hopeful that private insurers will also start paying for VR therapy.