Kalikanov Sultan, Baizhanova Aliya, Tungushpayev Meiram, Viderman Dmitriy
Department of Education, "University Medical Center" Corporate Fund, Astana, Kazakhstan.
Department of Surgery, School of Medicine, Nazarbayev University, Astana, Kazakhstan.
Front Med (Lausanne). 2025 Jul 9;12:1572464. doi: 10.3389/fmed.2025.1572464. eCollection 2025.
Musculoskeletal pain (MSK) is a condition that affects multiple parts of the musculoskeletal system, including limbs, neck, and back, leading to deterioration in both mental and physical health and overall quality of life. Despite the available treatments, they are not considered effective enough to eradicate pain symptoms, thereby requiring new methods as a substitute. This review comprehensively summarizes virtual reality (VR) technology as an adjunct or an alternative treatment for MSK pain and aims to explore the most suitable conditions and settings of VR.
Pubmed, Scopus, and Cochrane databases were searched for recent systematic reviews and meta-analyses investigating VR and MSK pain. The search was performed according to PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) guidelines and revealed 17 relevant articles. The AMSTAR-2 (A MeaSurement Tool to Assess systematic Reviews) analysis was conducted to assess the quality of included studies. The Corrected Covered Area was calculated to identify the degree of overlap.
The results found significant pain reduction and mental and physical improvements in patients with MSK pain in comparison to standard therapies in treating neck, knee, and back pain. Nevertheless, the heterogeneity and inconsistencies in results among papers were recognized. The promising aspects are multimodality, namely, VR in combination with exercises, patient acceptance of VR, and the effectiveness of immersive, non-immersive, and gamified versions. These findings also revealed the need for more research on underexplored regions, standardized methodologies, and personalized approaches.
To summarize, VR poses the potential to treat MSK pain as an adjunct, and future research is recommended to focus on improving methodological rigor and multimodal approaches.
OSF (https://osf.io/uyc7z).
肌肉骨骼疼痛（MSK）是一种影响肌肉骨骼系统多个部位的疾病，包括四肢、颈部和背部，会导致身心健康和整体生活质量下降。尽管有现有的治疗方法，但它们被认为不足以有效消除疼痛症状，因此需要新的方法作为替代。本综述全面总结了虚拟现实（VR）技术作为MSK疼痛的辅助或替代治疗方法，并旨在探索VR最合适的条件和设置。
在PubMed、Scopus和Cochrane数据库中搜索最近关于研究VR与MSK疼痛的系统评价和荟萃分析。根据PRISMA（系统评价和荟萃分析的首选报告项目）指南进行检索，共找到17篇相关文章。进行AMSTAR-2（评估系统评价的测量工具）分析以评估纳入研究的质量。计算校正覆盖面积以确定重叠程度。
结果发现，与标准疗法相比，MSK疼痛患者在治疗颈部、膝盖和背部疼痛时，疼痛明显减轻，身心状况得到改善。然而，各论文结果之间存在异质性和不一致性。有前景的方面包括多模态，即VR与运动相结合、患者对VR的接受度以及沉浸式、非沉浸式和游戏化版本的有效性。这些发现还表明需要对未充分探索的领域、标准化方法和个性化方法进行更多研究。
总之，VR有潜力作为辅助手段治疗MSK疼痛，建议未来的研究集中在提高方法的严谨性和多模态方法上。
