Use of the metaverse to prevent aggression against health workers (RELA-Verso)

Project objectives

Acts of violence against healthcare workers represent a significant threat to the health and safety of healthcare professionals, have a negative impact on productivity and the quality of care provided to patients.

Despite growing awareness, the incidence of the phenomenon has also increased during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

A healthcare organization permeated by a culture of safety should implement tools to improve the safety of its operators through structured and organized interventions that allow it to protect employees and patients from any form of violent behavior. This includes policies for workplace violence, an incident reporting system and requirements for non-punitive reporting, and resources for education/training and safety measures

The main objective of the “RELA-Verso” project (Use of the metaverse to prevent aggression against health workers) is to create a virtual reality (VR)/augmented reality (AR) to promote the ability of operators to deal with high-risk situations. high emotional participation and disseminate to all staff the knowledge of the potential risks and the techniques to follow to protect themselves and their colleagues from acts of violence.

To this end, the use of the metaverse in the healthcare sector and educational and training interventions to prevent and minimize workplace aggression aimed at healthcare workers will be framed from an epidemiological point of view; a medico-legal and juridical framework will be carried out to analyze the legislation, guidelines, standards of good clinical practice and national and international policy documents relating to safety for those practicing the healthcare and socio-healthcare professions; the criminological-phenomenological aspects of violence against healthcare workers will be highlighted; the social impact of violence against healthcare workers will be assessed and the degree of knowledge and acceptance of potential healthcare users and decision-makers will be measured; The ethical and deontological issues relating to the use of artificial intelligence (AI), virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR) and blockchain technology in the healthcare sector will be identified and analysed.

Start and end date

Project Manager

Coordinating institution of the project

Other Institutions involved

• Catholic University of Sacred Heart 
• Vita-Salute San Raffaele University

Source(s) of project funding