Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian is exploring new ways to support employees on the frontlines of the COVID-19 pandemic. With the launch of CenteredVR, a virtual reality-based mindfulness and stress management program developed by BehaVR, Hoag is among the first health care facilities in the nation to deploy virtual reality therapies to frontline workers. Piloting with nurses in Hoag’s COVID-19 unit, CenteredVR is a potential tool to help health care workers reduce chronic stress, build resilience and enhance coping skills.
“We have seen the power of virtual reality-enabled programming to support the mental health and well-being of our patients, so it was a natural fit for us to offer a tool like CenteredVR to our nurses,” said Robert Louis, M.D., Chief of Neurosurgery and the Empower360 Endowed Chair for Skull Base and Minimally Invasive Neurosurgery, Pickup Family Neurosciences Institute at Hoag. “Mindfulness practices are shown to reduce chronic stress and CenteredVR combines those principles with the neurological and psychological power of virtual reality, offering our nurses new resources to reduce stress and improve their overall health.”