The holder of a doctor of osteopathic medicine from Touro University, Dr. Aarohi Ambardekar subsequently completed an anesthesia residency at SUNY Health Sciences Center in New York and, since 2005, has been a partner with Southern Maryland Anesthesia Associates. Supplementing more than a decade of experience, Dr. Aarohi Ambardekar holds membership with the American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA).
ASA held its 2018 annual meeting from October 13 to 17 in San Francisco where, among other topics, participants had an opportunity to learn about the benefits of virtual reality as a means of alleviating pain and anxiety in children through a pair of presentations. The first was by University of Texas Southwestern Medical School professor Girish P. Joshi, MD, who outlined his study that involved 21 children, 10 of whom received virtual reality hypnosis (VRH) along with typical postoperative pain management following surgery. The other 11 did not receive VRH.
Children who received VRH participated in one 20-minute session per day for the three days after surgery and had a substantially lower need for further treatment: 20 percent of children in the VRH group needed IV morphine compared to 62.5 percent in the other group. Moreover, only 37.5 percent of children in the VRH group needed anti-anxiety medication as opposed to 100 percent in the other group. The other study presented, authored by Stanford University clinical associate professor Thomas J. Caruso, MD, found similar results with a much larger sample size of more than 600 patients.
