Patient using VR for play and distraction.

New Buddy Guard device makes shots easier and tear-free for kids

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National leader in scaling VR use in the hospital

With over 150 use cases per month, Stanford Medicine Children's Health is home to one of the nation's largest VR programs

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A national leader of creative innovation

Focusing on adapting existing technologies and creating new ones to address the unique needs of our patients

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Virtual Reality for anxiety relief

Transporting children to fun and imaginative places prior to procedures help alleviate anxiety

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CHARIOT Program

Childhood Anxiety Reduction through Innovation and Technology

The CHARIOT team at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford knows that undergoing surgery, anesthesia and procedures can be especially stressful for children. The goal of the program is to implement new technologies in the hospital that are nontraditional yet familiar to children in an effort to engage and distract them during these times. The focus is on taking existing technologies and creating new ones to address the unique needs of individual patients.

The Stanford environment offers a unique opportunity to create a team of physicians, engineers, researchers and child life professionals. The team is currently piloting virtual reality experiences, new tablet-based apps and interactive bedside projector-based games.

View our videos featuring Augmented Reality (AR) software, Sevo the Dragon, an interactive video game developed to transform anesthesia into a fun game, BERT (Bedside Entertainment Theater) reduces anxiety for young patients going into surgery and Virtual Reality (VR).