Communicate heal-th: a virtual reality training tool for optimizing expectancy effects in patient-provider interaction
As shown in the EXPECT-HEALTH project (617700), positive treatment expectations lead to improved health outcomes, while negative expectations have the opposite effect. To make use of this phenomenon in clinical practice, interventions have been developed to improve treatment expectations in patients, but these thus far only target the patient. A novel application would be to instead train healthcare professionals to optimize the expectations of their patients. This allows a much bigger audience to be reached with less investment. To make the training as efficient and effective as possible, state-of-the-art technological means must be used. We therefore propose an innovative virtual reality-based training tool for healthcare professionals, that will teach them to optimize expectations in their patients. In this project, the virtual training tool will be developed and brought to the pre-demonstration phase by a team of experts in expectancy effects on health and eHealth intervention development.