The Royal Children's Hospital Brisbane Centre for Burns Research have developed a number of clinical papers sponsored by Diversionary Therapy Technologies. Those that have been published and are available for public perusal are as follows:
Multi-modal Distraction: Using Technology to Combat Pain in Young Children with Burn Injuries
The Emergence of Multi-Modal Distraction as a Paediatric Pain Management Tool
The Development of a Paediatric Pain Management Device
General Information
There is an emphasis in the current clinical arena to establish appropriate pain management for children undergoing medical treatment and procedures. With advancements in the understanding of pain, protocols have adapted to involve a mixture of medication and distraction principles to ensure holistic pain management.
DITTO is a multi-modal sensory based distraction technology device that was developed from Virtual Reality concepts of "immersive distraction" but has been specifically designed to meet developmental and clinical challenges. It uses 3-Dimensional active-exploratory content within an open faced console that allows touch screen and full navigation about a scene.
Recent Published Trial Results 2009
Diversionary Therapy Technologies maintains close links to the Royal Children's Hospital Brisbane, and continues to monitor feedback gained in regular clinical trials. Research is currently ongoing with Professor Roy Kimble and staff at the Royal Children's Hospital Brisbane, Australia. The following information is drawn from the most recent study performed at the Royal Children's, Brisbane. These results have been published and are concerned with evaluating pain levels and clinic productivity.
|
|
Pain Reduction Children's pain and anxiety levels were measured during burns dressing application and removal over 3 separate outpatient visits. Pain scores were gathered from the child, the carer and the nurse. Two groups of patients used DITTO- one group used Procedural Preparation content and the other used Distraction content. The two control groups used either a PlayStation Portable or standard distraction techniques such as bubbles, songs and television. The graph demonstrates that use of DITTO with Procedural Preparation content produced the lowest pain and anxiety scores prior to commencement of the procedure. Use of DITTO with Distraction content produced the lowest pain and anxiety scores during the procedure. This was consistent across subsequent visits to the outpatient department where children continued to report less pain at each procedure. [Miller K, et al., Multi-modal distraction. Using technology to combat pain in young children with burn injuries, Burns, Volume 36, Issue 5, August 2010, Pages 647-658]
|
 |
Clinic Productivity The productivity graph on the left shows that DITTO Distraction and DITTO Procedural Preparation reduced the procedural times (time taken to remove and apply a dressing). This length of treatment continued to reduce over the three subsequent procedures (visits for dressing changes). Clinic efficiency is increased.
[Miller K, et al., Multi-modal distraction. Using technology to combat pain in young children with burn injuries, Burns, Volume 36, Issue 5, August 2010, Pages 647-658]
|
Preliminary Trial Results 2009: Orthopaedics
To date randomised control trials, with children aged 3-8 years, have assessed DITTO's potential in reducing pain and anxiety during medical procedures in 2 acute clinical settings: burns outpatient clinic and orthopaedic outpatient clinic. The results are discussed in the graphs below.
|
|
Orthopaedic Outpatient Study In the Orthopaedic study (n=60), results indicated that DITTO had a significant (p<0.05) effect in reducing child and clinician pain reports during cast removal/application. DITTO also reduced care giver reports of child anxiety during these procedures (p<0.05).
|
Future directions of Diversionary Therapy Technologies is to release the next stage prototype, which will lead into a commercially available product by 2010. Clinical trials will continue across a variety of medical domains and procedures such as pre-op, emergency and x-ray.