EXPLORING THE PERCEPTIONS AND EXPERIENCES OF SAUDI OCCUPATIONAL THERAPISTS (OTS) REGARDING THE USE OF VIRTUAL REALITY (VR) TECHNOLOGY AS AN INTERVENTION FOR PATIENTS WHO HAVE HAD A STROKE: A PHENOMENOLOGICAL QUALITATIVE STUDY

Abstract

Objectives: Stroke has often been regarded as a global burden that negatively affecting individuals leading to physical and cognitive impairments that restrict their independence. The occupational therapists (OTs), one of stroke rehabilitation team, are dealing with patients to address these issues. However, Virtual Reality (VR) has been recently reported to be used as an intervention in stroke rehabilitation. Thus, the aim of this study is to explore how VR technology is perceived by Saudi OTs and their clinical reasoning within Saudi culture. Methods: A phenomenological qualitative strategy was used to collect subjective narratives data from Saudi OTs regarding VR practice. Purposive sampling was used, and semi-structured online interviews were conducted on eight Saudi OTs. Interviews were recorded, and verbatim transcription were used for analysing data thematically. Results: Therapists reported positive experiences of using VR intervention: enjoyment, engagement, patient-therapists rapport enhancement, functional performance and goal achievement improvement which shortened patient’s stay length, games diversity. Some therapists experienced negative events pertaining to VR device lack of availability, technical issues, and limited resources. This study found new emerging issues that affected therapists’ decision on using such intervention including patients’ age, workload, and culture and language differences. While VR therapy considered as client-centered practice, therapists viewed occupation-based practice as challenging to apply. Conclusion: Although challenges presented in a still-developing country, the adoption of VR in Saudi hospitals found to be acceptable and feasible. However, issues related to VR devices such as technical issues, cost, accessibility limitations, and limited occupation-based and culturally inappropriate VR games necessitate a collaboration between researchers, therapists, developer, and engineers. The VR novelty and extremely limited availability imply for more adoption, and therapists and patients training to avoid side effects such as motion sickness. Moreover, understanding the therapists’ views inform the decision makers about facilitator and barrier of adopting immersive or non-immersive VR devices.