Virtual Reality Usage in Managing Pain Labor: A Scoping Review

ABSTRACT


Introduction
Childbirth is a fundamental physiological process that includes cultural, psychological, spiritual, and behavioral in a woman's life significantly [1].During the labor process, the pain increases along with the complete cervical dilatation.Labor pain is one of the most intense pains experienced by women during this process [2] because uterine contractions affect increased intrauterine pressure resulting in tension in the cervix.
The primary maternal care during labor and delivery is maintaining the mother's control over her pain, emotions, and actions.It has become a standard of care for labor to suggest nonpharmacological treatment before the use of pharmacological interventions.Non-pharmacological interventions are usually simple, safe, and inexpensive to use.One of the nurses' obligations is to provide support and encouragement to use nonpharmacological methods to patients and their partners [1].
Nonpharmacological methods of pain relief include a variety of techniques aimed at enhancing physical sensation and preventing the psycho-emotional perception of pain [2].In the era of society 5.0, the use of technology and information is one of the main pillars that can be developed in various aspects, including the management of pain during childbirth whereas one of them is the use of Virtual Reality (VR).
Currently, VR technology is widely used in the health sector and has also revolutionized medical techniques to distract the pain experienced [3,4,5].Distraction is an effective technique for reducing pain [6] experienced by mothers during labor.VR is used to reduce anxiety in pregnant women, reduce pain, and educate in training during labor [7].The objective of the review is to explore, investigate, and analyze research that uses VR to reduce pain during labor.

Materials and Method
This study used the Arksey & O'Malley [8] and Aromatoris & Munn [9] review scoping methods.Four electronic databases were Ebsco, Pubmed, Science direct, and Scopus.The keywords used were "pain labor OR pain delivery OR childbirth pain" AND "virtual reality OR augmented reality OR VR", with full-text inclusion criteria, Academic Journal, the publication year 2017-2022, and focusing on pain during childbirth.
The author conducted the search process to find relevant articles usage of virtual reality in labor pain.Searching articles using several keywords that have been adjusted to Medical Subject Heading (MeSH) to filter articles using predefined keywords.
In the selection process, the researcher used the Prisma extension approach for the scoping review [10] which was divided into 2 stages, title and abstract, and then a full text review.The first stage was to identify articles in 4 databases and obtain Ebsco (72), Pubmed (134), Science direct (253), and Scopus (25), then the total number of articles obtained was 484 articles.Then, we found 26 articles duplicated.Next, the researcher screened the articles by reading the detailed titles and abstracts according to the inclusion criteria and as many as 448 articles were excluded because there were no abstracts, the titles and abstracts did not match the topic and were not academic journals.Furthermore, the remaining articles were reviewed in full text and read by the researcher (S, Y.T), hence, 3 articles were excluded because they did not meet the requirements for use in the review literature: systematic review, meta-analysis, and these articles did not answer the research objectives.Thus, 7 articles were determined that met the requirements to be used in this review.
During the study selection process, researchers (S and Y.T) conducted independent reviews at each stage, where there was no significant difference in the assessment of the articles reviewed.The selection process for selected articles used guidelines from Peters et al., (2020) regarding Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR) (Figure 1) [11].
The results of data extraction were categorized: researcher's name, year of study, country/location of study, research design and instruments, results, and characteristics of the VR used (device, type of video, duration, phase/stage of labor).

Results and Discussion
Results A total of 2,948 articles were found in 4 electronic databases that match to the topic.Then several articles were excluded because the title and abstract were incomplete, the topic was not related to this research, it was not an academic-journals and it was not the full text (only the abstract).There are 7 articles that are in accordance with this research which will be discussed.

Discussion
This review was conducted to review and identify studies that use VR applications to help reduce pain during labor.It was found that the use of VR was effective and could be used to reduce labor pain.Two studies have similarities in that they use scuba diving videos (diving) by showing marine animals and the sounds of dolphins and manatees accompanied by classical music and relaxing nighttime sleep [12,16].Videos of natural scenery including animals and humans accompanied by natural sounds and music can provide a relaxing, relaxing effect and personal preference for scenery also has a significant effect on mood [19].In addition, viewing videos of natural scenery on the coast has a significant effect on reducing pain [20].
Two studies used VR with videos of natural scenery accompanied by sound [14,18], and one study showed videos of natural scenery such as sunsets, green meadows, oceans, and others [13].In addition, 2 other articles also use videos in the form of beach views, mountains, dolphins and whales swimming, palaces and forests, or other natural scenery to relieve and reduce pain in pregnant women and distract the experience of pain [21,22].
One study using video photos of newborns accompanied by classical music (Beethoven-Moonlight Sonata) with a duration of 10 minutes showed positive results in reducing pain during labor [15].In addition, 1 other study showed that the use of VR with videos of fetal ultrasound results was also very influential in reducing the pain experienced [17].In line with another study conducted by Buglione et al. (2020), it was stated that in nulliparous women with term singleton pregnancies, listening to music had a significant impact on reducing the level of pain experienced during labor.Gonenc & Dikmen stated that music can reduce pain in nulliparous women during the active phase of labor [24].In addition, this intervention can also be easily conducted by nurses and midwives, is affordable, and effective, and can provide opportunities for women and their partners to be actively involved in maternal care during and after delivery.
The use of VR, which is rich in multisensory stimuli in the form of sight and hearing, has a high enough potential to be used as a means of restoring patient health [25].Lier et al, explained that the use of VR can reduce pre-perceptual and perceptual brain activity after pain stimulation and has Table 1.Data Extraction an impact on reducing pain reactions through psychological, emotion and cognitive stimulation from nociceptor stimulation [26].Also, visual and audio factors play a pivotal role in obtaining the benefits of exposure to nature through the use of VR [27].Today's VR devices can provide vivid audiovisual stimuli and thus can create illusions that can be transported into virtual worlds and facilitate existence in natural environments.Virtual environments for virtual landscapes are usually based on high-quality and pleasant landscapes, thus VR can offer users an optimized experience and enhance positive psychological and physiological responses [28].However, there are several studies that state that the use of music therapy in the labor process which aims to reduce pain does not have a significant effect on both the latent and active phases.This can be caused by several factors including the sample size of the study, cultural characteristics, and the type of music they like.

Conclusion
Virtual reality is an effective non-pharmacological method for reducing pain during labor and does not affect the mother and fetus.The use of video is also very important and effective during the use of virtual reality, especially videos related to babies and natural scenery accompanied by sound effects.Although the results of the review show that VR can reduce pain, there is a need for further research regarding the effectiveness of VR using appropriate media and duration, as well as the need for guidelines in implementing the use of VR to reduce pain.

197
photograph albums has been found more effective than other interventions evaluated in reducing labor pain.