Science fiction is littered with cautionary tales about what happens when humankind and machinery mesh too closely together. If human-robot hybrids aren’t busy trying to ‘upgrade’ everybody as the Cybermen in ‘Doctor Who,’ they’re busy assimilating all the technology and organic matter they can find as the Borg in ‘Star Trek.’ Although we broadly welcome the use of technology when it comes to helping to treat and prevent disease, we’ve always been a little wary of it getting too close to the more intimate facets of our existence. Things don’t come much more intimate than childbirth, but it’s now being reported that the latest Virtual Reality technology could improve the experience of giving birth for expectant mothers.
Away From Entertainment?
When virtual reality technology has been used and promoted in the past, it’s always been in connection with the world of entertainment. VR gaming is slowly gaining a foothold in the market, both with console games that work with the Oculus Rift headset, and at online casinos. Virtual casinos are now a big deal within the field of gaming, where some mobile slots websites are offering roulette games that allow players access to a ‘real’ dealer via the use of VR. Although the online slots themselves are still played by swiping at the screen, things are fast approaching the point where the whole idea of a mobile slots game might not involve staring at your smartphone at all. Instead, mobile slots websites might allow you to connect your mobile phone to your headset and play as if the slot was right in front of you. Such technology is only a generation away at the most.
We have seen virtual reality used elsewhere though – it’s used in sports all the time, and we never even think about it. The Hawk-Eye system which judges whether shots are ‘in’ or ‘out’ in tennis is a form of virtual reality. The decision review system which is used in cricket is also virtual reality – it simulates the bath of the ball moving through the batsman and to the stumps, and therefore decides whether a batsman should be in or out had their leg not gotten in front of the wicket. That’s literally simulating reality – we just don’t think of it that way because it isn’t referred to as such.
Virtual reality has been slowly springing up all around us without our noticing. Medical use of the technology is an obvious next step – but how could it be used to aid pregnancies and births?
How Does VR Help?
The first trials of virtual reality assistance in childbirth are happening in Cardiff, Wales. If they’re successful, they could be moved out to cover all of Wales, and potentially then the rest of the United Kingdom. The type of virtual reality being used in the tests is gentle and non-invasive – it’s simply a case of distracting the person giving birth from the environment that they’re in, and therefore assisting with pain reduction, and reducing stress levels.
Giving birth can be a traumatic experience regardless of whether it’s someone’s first baby or their fifth, and the team behind the research believe that the environment of a hospital can add to the trauma. Being surrounded by a team of unfamiliar doctors, the sight of blood, and the sound of medical machinery can increase stress levels and make a birth more difficult than it needs to be. Virtual reality headsets are believed to be able to nullify at least some of that effect.
Although mothers will still be able to feel the birth process occurring, and hear a degree of the activity around them, the VR headsets they’re wearing will show them a much calmer environment. Popular choices during trails so far have included swimming with dolphins, watching the northern lights, and sitting on a deserted beach as the tide slowly comes in. Each virtual landscape is specifically tailored to be as soothing as possible, diverting at least some of the brain’s focus from the more stressful aspects of what their body is going through. There are no intended physical benefits to the VR trials, but is a mother is able to relax then the process becomes smoother both for them and the people trying to deliver their baby.
VR As A Form Of Therapy?
Based on the above, it would seem that the VR experiment in Cardiff is more about therapy than it is about treatment. The remainder of the pregnancy process will remain the same – patients will still be administered the same pain-relief options as are provided to them now, and the process of giving birth is unchanged other than the addition of the virtual reality headset. Nobody is required to participate in the trial – patients are given the option as they start going into labor, and the research is only performed on those who consent. Based on the BBC article, the responses so far have been positive.
If virtual reality can be demonstrated to make the process of giving birth easier, it might then lead on to use in other forms of medical care. Operations which require local as opposed to general anesthetic might incorporate the use of virtual reality, as a patient who is being distracted from a medical process is less likely to panic about it than one who’s watching what’s being done to them. There are also obvious implications for people who are being treated for stress or trauma-related conditions.
The further penetration of virtual reality into our lives is an inevitability. The technology has developed to a point where the line between what’s real and what’s digitally generated can be blurred, and a completely convincing three-dimensional landscape can now be rendered inside a VR headset. What was once considered to be a video gamer’s pleasure – or a more immersive way of watching movies – may now turn out to have more practical applications than we originally considered. That makes us wonder where else virtual reality may turn out to have a use that we hadn’t thought of before. As with all things, we’re going to have to wait and see.
