Shirley Roth Shema, Marina Brozgol, Moran Dorfman, Inbal Maidan, Lior Sharaby-Yeshayahu, Hila Malik-Kozuch, Orly Wachsler Yannai, Nir Giladi, Jeffrey M Hausdorff, Anat Mirelman
Overview
Virtual reality (VR) technology is a relatively new rehabilitation tool that can deliver a combination of cognitive and motor training for fall prevention. The attitudes of older people to such training are currently unclear.
Objective:
In this study, we aimed to determine: (1) the attitudes of fall-prone older people towards fall prevention exercise with and without VR; (2) the changes in attitudes following intervention with and without VR; and (3) user satisfaction following fall prevention exercise with and without VR.
Methods:
A total of 281 fall-prone older people were randomly assigned to either an experimental group receiving treadmill training plus virtual reality (TT+VR, n = 144) or a control group receiving treadmill training alone (TT, n = 137). (1) Attitudes toward fall prevention exercise with and without VR (AQ); and (2) user satisfaction (USQ) were assessed using two questionnaires. After the intervention, AQ was assessed twice. USQ was measured only after the intervention.
Results:
At baseline and after intervention, 82.2% and 80.6% of participants had favorable attitudes towards fall prevention exercise. By contrast, only 53.6% of respondents at baseline were enthusiastic about fall prevention exercise with VR. The attitudes towards TT+VR improved after intervention (83.1%; p * 0.001), and 99.2% indicated that they enjoyed it. Correlation analyses indicated that postintervention attitudes were strongly related to user satisfaction (USQ: r = 0.503; p 0.001).
Conclusions:
VR experience positively influenced older people’s attitudes towards fall prevention exercise. From the user’s point of view, VR is an attractive training mode, and improving service provision for older people is vital.
GaitBetter is an implementation of the V-TIME on which many of these papers are based.