The Reality of Virtual Experiences for Medtech

Several years ago, while strolling through a Best Buy store, I came upon a sales representative offering demos of the Oculus Rift, which was still relatively new to the consumer space. As I had never tried one, I decided to take the opportunity to check out the experience.

After getting the headset into position, my hands and, more specifically, fingers found the buttons on the controllers to be pretty intuitive and ergonomically placed. As someone who enjoys home game systems, I found the controls very easy to use, but didn’t get the impression that background was required for someone else to find the controllers just as comfortable.

The demonstration involved a rock climbing simulation that presented a very cool experience. That is, however, until I looked down. That’s when a sudden feeling of vertigo took hold. Not sure that’s exactly the right description, but my body certainly reacted to the fact that I was “so high up” on the rock face. With both feet planted firmly on the ground in that Best Buy, I still had exhilaration overtake me—with a fair bit of fear mixed in—as a result of the virtual experience. In that moment, I realized just how engaging this technology could be.

Since that time, I’ve had the opportunity to try other virtual reality (VR) technology to “fly around” the human heart and other organs (got a bit of nausea from that one), ride a roller coaster (felt a little nauseous from that one too), and perform a surgical procedure (think I killed the patient during that one). While my experiences may not have been ideal for me (or my patient), the potential value to medical device companies has been made crystal clear.

Not only does VR present a great way to expose doctors and other medical professionals to new technologies, it also allows developers to gain critical insights into how they may interact with the technology. Further, the feedback provided isn’t only what the person virtually trying out a device says, but also the way they try to interact with it. An engineer can don a headset from their facility and observe a doctor thousands of miles away in a virtual environment as the physician examines an instrument that engineer is developing.

Recently, I had another opportunity to try out VR technology. But this time, it wasn’t at a company’s booth at an industry event. Rather, the experience took place in my home office (i.e., basement), which is where I’ve been working for the last 12 months during the pandemic. The accommodating company, FundamentalVR, had sent me the demo unit so I could virtually meet with CEO Richard Vincent. A couple of representatives from the company met with me via a Teams call to ensure my setup went smoothly (which it did), and it wasn’t long before I was logging into a virtual environment to be greeted by Vincent.

Since this room resembled a realistic environment, I fortunately did not encounter any nausea as I had with some of my previous thrill-ride VR experiences. Also, the longer I spoke with Vincent and sampled the demonstration devices set out for me to try, the more comfortable I became with the VR technology. I could very easily see how the novelty of the VR system could fade while a doctor became more interested in a new device being designed so he or she could provide feedback on its development. I was rapidly getting accustomed to moving about the room, picking up and pulling the trigger on a surgical instrument, and interacting with other elements of the environment. I even found myself nodding in agreement as we spoke, wondering if my virtual avatar that Vincent saw nodded as well (I know the avatar head turns based on where you are looking).

As impressive as this virtual meeting was (again, considering it was taking place from the convenience of my basement), it still doesn’t match the experience I had with the same company’s haptic-enabled VR set-up at an annual NASS (North American Spine Society) meeting (pre-pandemic, of course). There I was able to “feel” a device as I performed a surgical procedure on a virtual patient requiring spinal fusion.

The haptic feedback provided through the handheld controllers offered a distinct difference between bone, muscle, and other soft tissues as I prodded an instrument around the patient’s spine. Unfortunately, there isn’t a “home” version of this system, but with further development, it may not be far off. And when it is available, FundamentalVR will likely be open to adopt it as their software is hardware agnostic.

In the meantime, I would encourage medtech firms to explore VR technology to demonstrate new devices to physicians, enable surgeons to practice procedures or focus on one aspect, gain critical feedback from doctors during product development, or simply maintain a more natural experience while communicating with customers. Undoubtedly, even more applications will continue to emerge, so best for you and your customers to get acquainted with the technology sooner rather than later. 

Sean Fenske, Editor-in-Chief
[email protected]