Emerging Applications of Virtual Reality in Cardiovascular Medicine

Area of Science:

• Medical Technology
• Cardiology Applications
• Extended Reality (XR)

Background:

• Mobile computing advancements have enabled extended reality (XR) technologies to overcome previous limitations in medical adoption.
• Key XR hardware improvements include untethered, lightweight head-mounted displays and see-through displays for environmental interaction.
• Enhanced processing power in XR devices now synchronizes with human perception, mitigating motion sickness.

Purpose of the Study:

• To detail the current applications of extended reality (XR) in cardiology.
• To highlight the technological advancements enabling XR's integration into medical practices.
• To explore XR's role in medical education, pre-procedural planning, intraprocedural visualization, and patient rehabilitation within cardiology.

Main Methods:

• Review of recent developments in extended reality (XR) hardware and software.
• Analysis of current research and clinical implementations of XR in cardiology.
• Identification of specific XR applications across various cardiology domains.

Main Results:

• Extended reality (XR) technologies are demonstrating significant potential across multiple cardiology applications.
• Improvements in display technology and processing power are key enablers for medical XR adoption.
• Cardiology is actively utilizing XR for enhanced training, planning, real-time guidance, and rehabilitation.

Conclusions:

• Extended reality (XR) is rapidly becoming a viable and impactful tool in modern cardiology.
• The convergence of hardware and software advancements is driving the adoption of XR in clinical settings.
• XR applications promise to revolutionize cardiology education, procedures, and patient care.