The Effectiveness of Virtual Reality Distraction on Dental Anxiety During Local Anaesthesia among Adolescents – A Randomized Controlled Trial

Abstract

Objective: To determine the impact of the clinical use of virtual reality distraction in reducing anxiety levels in adolescents during local anaesthetic (LA) administration.

Methods: This was a randomized controlled study. Study participants comprised of adolescents aged 10 -17 years attending the Paediatric Dentistry outpatient Clinic of University of Benin Teaching Hospital, Benin City. One hundred and fifty-eight adolescents who presented for treatment and met inclusion criteria were included and randomly divided into two groups; a control group without distraction and a study group with distraction using a Quest Oculus VR headset. Anxiety was assessed using subjective (MDAS) and physiologic (pulse rate, heart rate, oxygen saturation, respiratory rate and temperature) methods respectively, pre-treatment and post treatment.  The IBM SPSS version 20 was used to analyze the data. The level of significance was set at p<0.05.

Results: A total of 156 participants with a mean age of 13.56±1.682 years were recruited in the study. The mean scores for MDAS after the administration of LA for the control and study group was 14.74 ± 3.35 and 10.09 ± 1.90 and this was statistically significant (P<0.001). PR had a mean value of 88.06 ± 11.19 and 93.56 ± 10.10 in the control and study group respectively before LA and was statistically significant (P= 0.002). However, after the administration of LA, the mean values were 97.08 ± 10.96 and 89.19 ± 10.17 showing a significant rise in the control group and decrease in the study group respectively (P <0.001). Temperature, systolic BP and SPo2 showed slight changes between the control and study groups before and after administration of LA but these were not statistically significant. The sociodemographic factors which played a role in anxiety levels (as recorded in PR variation) following linear regression analysis were position in family, study group and site of administration (P = 0.018; 0.003 and <0.001) respectively.

Conclusion: Virtual Reality distraction significantly reduced pain and anxiety during administration of local anaesthesia in adolescents undergoing dental treatment.