⚡ Quick Summary
This narrative review explores the transformative potential of the metaverse in medical education and healthcare systems, highlighting its ability to enhance learning and patient interactions through technologies like AI, AR, and VR. While the metaverse offers exciting opportunities, it also presents challenges such as accessibility and ethical concerns.
🔍 Key Details
- 📊 Focus: Impact of the metaverse on medical education and healthcare.
- 🧩 Technologies involved: AI, AR, VR, Internet of Medical Devices, quantum computing.
- 📅 Study period: Comprehensive literature review conducted across multiple databases.
- 🏆 Key findings: The metaverse can improve health education, advocacy training, and patient outcomes.
🔑 Key Takeaways
- 🌐 The metaverse is reshaping medical education by providing immersive learning experiences.
- 💡 It enhances communication skills between medical professionals and patients.
- 📉 Accessibility issues: Only 37% of 15-24-year-olds have internet access.
- 👓 AR/VR technology can be costly and may cause discomfort.
- ⚠️ Ethical concerns regarding data security and privacy must be addressed.
- 🧑⚕️ The metaverse should complement traditional clinical training, not replace it.
- 📈 Increased familiarity with the metaverse can enhance its adoption in healthcare settings.
- 🌍 Potential for global collaboration and data sharing in medical sciences.
📚 Background
The metaverse represents a convergence of digital and physical realities, offering a platform where healthcare professionals can engage in innovative educational practices. As medical education evolves, the integration of technologies such as AI, AR, and VR is becoming increasingly essential. These technologies not only enhance learning but also improve patient interactions, making them vital for future healthcare professionals.
🗒️ Study
This narrative review involved a thorough search of literature using keywords related to the metaverse, medical education, and healthcare. The authors screened results from databases like PubMed, Scopus, and Web of Science to gather relevant articles that inform the current understanding of the metaverse’s impact on medical sciences.
📈 Results
The findings indicate that the metaverse is poised to significantly influence medical education and healthcare delivery. It offers new avenues for health education, advocacy training, and improving patient outcomes. However, the study also highlights limitations, such as the high cost of AR/VR technologies and the need for ethical considerations in their application.
🌍 Impact and Implications
The implications of integrating the metaverse into medical education are profound. By facilitating immersive learning experiences, the metaverse can enhance the skills of healthcare professionals and improve patient care. However, addressing challenges such as accessibility and ethical concerns is crucial for its successful implementation. The potential for global collaboration and data sharing could also lead to advancements in medical research and practice.
🔮 Conclusion
This review underscores the importance of the metaverse in shaping the future of medical education and healthcare. As we move forward, it is essential to view the metaverse as a valuable supplement to traditional training methods, ensuring that healthcare professionals are well-equipped to meet the challenges of modern medicine. Continued research and dialogue in this area will be vital for harnessing its full potential.
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Metaverse and its impact on medical education and health care system: A narrative review.
Abstract
BACKGROUND AND AIMS: The metaverse has enormous potential in health care, continuously developing and offering innovative solutions by combining artificial intelligence (AI), augmented reality (AR)/virtual reality (VR), Internet of Medical Devices, and quantum computing technologies. In addition to using virtual platforms to help and boost medical education, familiarity with this platform is necessary to strengthen medical skills and communication with patients in medical sciences in the future.
METHODS: We conducted a comprehensive search using keywords and their MeSH synonyms, including “metaverse,” “medical education,” and “health care,” across PubMed, Scopus, and Web of Science. After screening the results, relevant articles were selected to inform the writing of this manuscript.
RESULTS: The metaverse is shaping the future of medical sciences, offering new opportunities for health education, advocacy training, and patient outcome improvement. The combination of real and virtual worlds may advance international relations, facilitate data sharing, increase medical care speed, and reduce infectious diseases. The metaverse, despite its benefits, has some limitations. Only 37% of 15-24-year-olds have internet access, and AR/VR glasses are expensive and may cause eye discomfort. It is also a potential risk for medical students, who may need help understanding the limitations of simulations and develop unrealistic expectations. Considering the metaverse as a supplement to clinical practice, not a replacement for supervised training, is crucial. Ethical concerns, data security, privacy, and lack of instructions for education are also issues. However, providing information about the metaverse can increase health care workers’ attribution to use it for patient examinations, students’ education, and tests.
CONCLUSION: This paper explores the impact of the metaverse on medical science education and underscores the need to integrate the metaverse into all areas of medical sciences as a supplement to existing evidence.
Author: [‘Ghaempanah F’, ‘Moasses Ghafari B’, ‘Hesami D’, ‘Hossein Zadeh R’, ‘Noroozpoor R’, ‘Moodi Ghalibaf A’, ‘Hasanabadi P’]
Journal: Health Sci Rep
Citation: Ghaempanah F, et al. Metaverse and its impact on medical education and health care system: A narrative review. Metaverse and its impact on medical education and health care system: A narrative review. 2024; 7:e70100. doi: 10.1002/hsr2.70100