Ever since Facebook changed its name to Meta, ‘metaverse’ has become a buzzword that has gained significant attention and investment in many different industries. Most people are probably aware of how gaming companies are using Virtual Reality (VR), Augmented Reality (AR), and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to make gaming experiences more immersive and life-like. However other companies including Google, Microsoft, Nike, and Adidas are either building their own metaverse or creating products for the metaverse.
But what is a metaverse? While the definition can be quite vague and broad, what is agreed upon is that the metaverse is a combination of VR, AR, and AI that creates an online environment so immersive that it can create real interactions and experiences. VR alone typically refers to the use of technology to create a digital environment that an individual can interact with using a headset or other device. The metaverse, on the other hand, is a collective virtual shared space where multiple people can interact with each other and with digital objects and environments. The metaverse is often described as a more expansive and ambitious concept than VR, as it involves the creation of a seamless and interconnected virtual world [1-2].
Although healthcare is probably among the last applications of the metaverse that comes to mind, it is nonetheless another industry heavily investing in this technology and promising immense potential. What will healthcare in the metaverse look like? Currently, electronic healthcare focuses on digital therapeutics, where treating patients involves the use of monitors and sensors, virtual consultations or tracking apps. The metaverse goes far beyond this, merging the digital and physical worlds and allowing us to essentially ‘live’ in the world of 1’s and 0’s. The healthcare industry is already being transformed by the metaverse, with virtual pharmacies and hospitals not being too far from reality.
Well known health brands are already looking to establish themselves in the metaverse. CVS Health, for example, wants to trademark its logo and open a virtual store, as well as create downloadable virtual goods. They also want to transition some of their in-store health services to a virtual setting, such as non-emergency medical treatment services, wellness programs, and health lifestyle and nutrition counseling [3]. With this kind of information becoming more accessible to patients through the metaverse, the platform could be used to create immersive educational experiences for patients, allowing them to learn more about their conditions and create management plans.
If we can picture a virtual pharmacy in the metaverse, it’s not hard to imagine simulated social environments where patient groups can actually meet and interact. In fact, the line between virtual and physical reality could become even more blurred with technology like VR gloves that allow virtual worlds to become tangible. Getting a virtual ‘hug’ that you can actually feel, for instance, could have a substantial impact on the outcomes of people living with mental health conditions induced by isolation. This technology, developed by the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology (EMPA), could also enable doctors to conduct physical examinations virtually, which eliminates some of the need for in-person hospital visits [4].
Advances in technology have allowed VR to evolve from simply being three-dimensional movies to fully interactable worlds, even allowing for data integration to create human avatars, or ‘digital twins’. By incorporating large amounts of data, including genome sequencing, imaging data, and health statistics, our digital twin can be used not only to simulate social interactions in the metaverse, but also to tailor treatment programs, predict outcomes, and optimize surgical procedures. One company that is already working on this is Latus Health, an online healthcare provider specializing in occupational health.
Latus Health CEO Jared Latto describes his vision of metaverse where digital twins will be used as ‘test dummies’ to predict everything from how we will recover from surgery to the reactions we will have to specific medicines [5]. Although this does not sound very different from AI medicine, the metaverse adds significant value by its ability to integrate individual systems into a unified healthcare infrastructure. Predicted outcomes could be used to facilitate augmented clinical trials as well as follow-up and rehabilitation in the metaverse.
Latto also describes the use of blockchain to allow individuals to own and store their medical health records and data, making it easy to access and share without the fear of being hacked. Latus Health is currently developing virtual hospitals, accessed through a headset, where treatments will at first be focused around counseling and physiotherapy services. With VR and AR, the company hopes to combine patient monitoring and easy data sharing to provide quicker and more effective healthcare to patients.
Patients living with phobias, PTSD, OCD, anxiety and other mental illnesses are also being treated with VR in the metaverse. Mental health conditions have been on the rise in the U.S., especially in the post-COVID world, with nearly 10% of Americans suffering from depression as of this year [6]. The California-founded company 2B3D is creating VR-based games, consultation and therapy that can be accessed in the metaverse to provide mental health treatment to U.S. veterans, another group highly affected by the U.S. mental health crisis [7]. What distinguishes this from just VR exposure therapy (which has been available for a long time) is that patients would put on a headset to enter a virtual clinic, be seen and diagnosed by a real doctor operating an avatar, and potentially interact with other real people or environments in the metaverse.
Currently, the FDA is still in the very early stages of regulating healthcare services and therapeutics in the metaverse, as well as evaluating how effective these will be compared to current standards of care. There are few ongoing clinical trials comparing metaverse assisted treatment with standard treatment. One such study is on home monitoring of diabetic macular edema using the HoloLens2 headset and a self-administered optical coherence tomography (OCT) which performs scanning and monitoring for patients with retinal diseases, and a self-administrated smartphone-based visual acuity tester. The results of this study are not yet published [8].
While the potential benefits of using the metaverse for healthcare are numerous, there are also concerns that need to be addressed. Some of these include issues related to privacy and security, as sensitive medical information would be stored and shared in virtual spaces. There are also concerns about the potential for addiction and overuse of the metaverse in healthcare, as well as the need for clear guidelines and regulations to ensure that the technology is used ethically and responsibly. Additionally, concerns about the cost and accessibility of using the metaverse for healthcare are growing, as not everyone will be able to afford or have access to the necessary technology (such as headsets and haptics).
So how soon will the metaverse become part of everyday life? The term and concept of the metaverse was first introduced in Neal Stephenson's 1992 science fiction novel Snow Crash, and since then, many technology companies and researchers have been working on developing the technology and infrastructure needed to create a shared virtual space. Although significant progress has been made, the creation of a fully realized metaverse is a complex and ambitious undertaking that will undoubtedly take many more years of development, innovation, and testing before it becomes a part of everyday life.
Edited by Tyler Dorrity
References
Mystakidis S. Metaverse. Encyclopedia. 2022; 2(1):486-497. https://doi.org/10.3390/encyclopedia2010031
Wang, G., Badal, A., Jia, X. et al. Development of metaverse for intelligent healthcare. Nat Mach Intell 4, 922–929 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s42256-022-00549-6
HealthcareFinance “Metaverse and virtual reality are gaining a foothold in healthcare” Jul 01, 2022
Moeinnia, Hadi, Haotian Su, and Woo Soo Kim. "Novel Grasping Mechanisms of 3D‐Printed Prosthetic Hands." Advanced Intelligent Systems (2022): 2200189.
Forbes “The Amazing Possibilities of Healthcare in the Metaverse”. Feb 23, 2022
Goodwin RD, Dierker LC, Wu M, Galea S, Hoven CW, Weinberger AH. Trends in U.S. Depression Prevalence From 2015 to 2020: The Widening Treatment Gap. Am J Prev Med. 2022 Nov;63(5):726-733. doi: 10.1016/j.amepre.2022.05.014. Epub 2022 Sep 19. PMID: 36272761; PMCID: PMC9483000.
TechRepublic “Building the future of healthcare in the metaverse” Aug15, 2022
Clinical Trial # NCT05223569 (https://www.clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT05223569?term=metaverse&draw=2&rank=2)
