@inproceedings{10.1145/3822516.3834867,
author = {Cos-Garcia, Mariona Baizhi and Opisso, Eloy and Romero, Alicia and Hern{\'a}ndez, Elena and R{\'i}os, Alejandro and Moncl{\'u}s, Eva and V{\'a}zquez, Pere-Pau},
title = {Insomnia VR: A Serious Game Pilot Study Exploring the Effects of Virtual Reality on Insomnia in Individuals with Spinal Cord Injury Undergoing Inpatient Rehabilitation},
year = {2026},
isbn = {9798400728105},
publisher = {Association for Computing Machinery},
address = {New York, NY, USA},
url = {https://doi.org/10.1145/3822516.3834867},
doi = {10.1145/3822516.3834867},
abstract = {Sleep disturbances are frequent amongst hospitalised patients and even though they are viewed as secondary problems, sleep is an essential biological process that can directly affect patients’ recovery. These disorders are managed through pharmacological treatments, which may present limited effectiveness and undesirable side effects in the long-term perspective. As a result, there is a growing interest in complementary non-pharmacological interventions with less invasive treatments. This paper evaluates the feasibility, acceptability, and preliminary effects of a virtual reality (VR) application to improve well-being and sleep-related outcomes in people undergoing inpatient rehabilitation. Our application serves as a prototype and contains three serious games. The application was developed for a commercially available VR headset (Meta Quest 3) and initially evaluated in 20 healthy participants to assess user experience. Subsequently, it was tested in seven individuals with varying baseline levels of insomnia during a two-week period of inpatient rehabilitation following spinal cord injury (SCI). All participants showed reductions in Athens Insomnia Scale (AIS) scores after the intervention, with baseline ratings ranging from moderate to severe insomnia improving to lower severity categories. Participants also reported improvements in sleep latency, nocturnal awakenings, and daytime alertness. User experience evaluations indicated high levels of enjoyment, as well as a strong willingness to continue using and recommend the intervention. These findings suggest that VR-based serious games are a feasible and well-accepted complementary tool for sleep support in hospitalized patients.},
booktitle = {Proceedings of the 31st ACM International Conference on 3D Web Technology},
articleno = {1},
numpages = {12},
keywords = {Virtual Reality, Insomnia, Serious Games},
location = {Doha, Qatar},
series = {Web3D '26}
}