Illiana Lopez’s first interaction with the Chariot Program’s virtual reality (VR) experience for parents of patients began in the emergency room (ER) waiting for her daughter.
“We were sitting in the ER just waiting and stressed because we didn’t know what was going on,” she said. “A student doctor came over and asked me if I was interested in experiencing the technology.”
On May 26, a complication with her daughter’s condition brought them to the Lucile Packard emergency room. Her four-year-old daughter was born with hypoplastic left heart syndrome, a heart condition that impacts the body’s ability to circulate blood properly. Her daughter, who was born at Lucile Packard, has undergone three open heart surgeries at the hospital.
“We are unfortunately very familiar with the hospital,” Lopez said.
Parents and caregivers of patients in the hospital often experience immense levels of stress. While the patient’s health is the priority, hospitals can fail to recognize the mental toll the process takes on parents and caregivers.
Thomas Caruso, pediatric anesthesiologist and co-founder of the Stanford Chariot Program, identified this need and seeks to fill this void.
The Chariot Program, a clinical and research program, applies modern technology to improve holistic patient, family and staff care. One of their newest initiatives utilizes virtual reality (VR) headsets as tools of meditation and relaxation for the parents and caregivers of hospital patients, expanding the program beyond just patients and staff to reach the needs of parents.
“We can only imagine the stress a parent feels when their child is hospitalized, so it felt natural to develop a targeted intervention for parental anxiety,” Caruso said.
The VR experience for parents is a six-minute guided meditation that uses breathing exercises to transport users to calming environments. VR-guided meditation decreased parental anxiety by around 30%, according to a study on the Chariot Program’s VR meditation initiative.
“It took my mind off of what was actually happening to my daughter. I kind of forgot I was sitting in the ER for six minutes,” Lopez said.
Since Lopez’s first experience with VR meditation, the Chariot Program has stationed a VR headset in her daughter’s hospital room for Lopez to use at will. Lopez said she spends almost every hour of the day in a hospital room. When using the VR, she’s able to “get [her] mind off of being in a hospital room,” she said.
“The Chariot program is impacting the Lucile Packard community in a really positive way,” Lopez said, “Everyone that is in here, from patients to parents, are under a lot of stress, and it is so nice to know you have resources like this.”
The Chariot Program, only eight years old, has many initiatives that aim to reduce anxiety in patients prior to major and minor operations using VR and augmented reality. Caruso and his co-founding partner Sam Rodriguez, also a pediatric anesthesiologist, have rounded out patient care by providing family-centered care prioritizing mental health and well-being.
In addition to VR headsets and augmented reality, the program also provides distraction and joy to patients with robotic pets. They also supplement patient education with personalized VR learning for children who cannot leave their hospital room to attend school.
Although the program’s scope has changed a lot, their vision has stayed consistent, according to Caruso.
The program originated with Rodriguez’s vision 10 years ago where he used projectors and TV screens to distract children prior to their anesthesia, a calming that was previously done through the use of various sedative drugs.
Soon, word got around the hospital of Rodriguez’s methods, and “every patient and parent were asking for this alternative,” said Caruso. As Rodriguez and Caruso partnered up to start formalizing the method, their creative approach caught the eye of hospital donors.
An unexpected, significant donation allowed Caruso and Rodriguez to begin the Chariot Program and advance their work. Today, the Chariot Program has partnered with over 100 national and international institutional partners to provide patients and parents with holistic health care.
Lopez said she understands that parents of patients often have a very difficult time taking care of themselves when their sole focus is their child’s well-being. But, she hopes that parents won’t be scared to take a leap of faith to try the technology and recognize the need to take care of themselves as well.
“I just hope everyone gives themselves the opportunity to experience it at least once,” Lopez said.