Exploring the multidimensional profiles of virtual reality education on nursing personnel's comprehensive qualities: A systematic review and meta-analysis.
TL;DR
Current evidence suggests that VR-based teaching may have a positive effect on enhancing nursing competencies, and further well-designed studies with standardised outcome measures are warranted to confirm the effectiveness of VR-based teaching.
Abstract
Aims
To comprehensively evaluate the impact of virtual reality (VR) teaching on nursing competencies, thereby providing an evidence-based foundation for its application in nursing education.
Design
Systematic review and meta-analysis. DATA SOURCES PubMed, the Cochrane Library, Embase, Web of Science, Scopus, CNKI, Wanfang and VIP databases were searched by title and abstract from January 1990 to March 2026.
Methods
This study was conducted in strict accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines. A meta-analysis was performed for all studies from which the mean and standard deviation could be obtained (n = 21).
Results
A total of 21 studies involving 1910 participants were included. Compared with traditional teaching methods, VR-based teaching showed potential advantages across multiple key competency indicators (P < 0.05), although the evidence was heterogeneous. In terms of knowledge and skills, marked improvements were observed in knowledge acquisition (I2 > 90.7%, SMD = 0.64, 95% CI 0.28, 1.01), clinical task performance (I2 > 93.6%, SMD = 0.79, 95% CI 0.14, 1.43), and specific skill operations (I2 > 93.9%, SMD = 1.06, 95% CI 0.44, 1.68). In the psychological domains, nurses in the VR group showed significantly greater improvements in self-confidence (I2 > 95.8%, SMD = 1.06), self-efficacy (I2 > 84.4%, SMD = 0.73), and learning motivation (I2 > 51.9%, SMD = 0.94) compared with the control groups. For subjective perceptions, participants reported substantially higher learning satisfaction (I2 > 91.2%, SMD = 1.19), attitude scores (I2 > 53.6%, SMD = 0.60) alongside enhanced capacity for learning (I2 > 11.5%, SMD = 0.59).
Conclusions
In conclusion, current evidence suggests that VR-based teaching may have a positive effect on enhancing nursing competencies. Nevertheless, considering the substantial heterogeneity across studies and the methodological limitations of the included trials, these findings should be interpreted with caution, and further well-designed studies with standardised outcome measures are warranted to confirm the effectiveness of VR-based teaching.