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At a conference on aging two years ago, slipped on a pair of virtual reality (VR) goggles and found herself inside the mind of a person with dementia.��

The simulation cast her as an older adult in the grips of delusion: frozen in fear at the end of a hallway, watching the floor disappear beneath rising water. “There was no actual flooding,” Chen recalled, “but I could feel the panic.”��

Chen, an assistant professor of social work in the College of Public Health at �鶹��Ƶ, specializes in aging and dementia and immediately recognized the technology’s potential for nursing home staff. She imagined caregivers seeing what she saw and walking away with a new kind of understanding and empathy for their dementia patients.��

Working with . to adapt their VR technology, Chen launched a pilot this spring to train certified nursing assistants (CNAs) at a Northern Virginia nursing home. The three-part program combined immersive VR scenarios with online lessons and group discussions.��

Wearing headsets, participants stepped into the disoriented minds of dementia patients—experiencing the confusion, fear, and memory lapses firsthand. In one scene, a woman lies in bed, panicked. She recognizes her pajamas but not the room surrounding her, and wonders aloud, “Where is my husband?”��

Chen partnered with fellow social work professor to design the educational framework. The VR footage, originally produced in Japan, was updated for English-speaking users through artificial intelligence (AI)-generated voiceovers.��

Support for an unsung profession��

Beyond improving patient care, the project aims to support caregivers working in a field plagued by high turnover, low wages, and minimal if any formal training. In the United States, nursing homes face an and, even as demand for direct care remains high.��

Though they perform some of the toughest jobs in health care, Chen said, nursing home staff are often treated as disposable. “There’s little investment in CNAs, because it’s assumed they’ll just leave—but if nursing homes invested, that would change.”��

Eventually, Chen hopes to help create new VR scenes set in American care settings and filmed in English. But even with cultural differences, CNAs in the Northern Virginia pilot—many of whom spoke English as a second language—found the material relatable.��

“They said, ‘We have seen this. We’ve experienced this scenario in here,’” said Zeynep Senturk Mannix, a George �鶹��Ƶ Master of Social Work student who helped Chen facilitate the sessions. “They didn’t even register that the actors were Japanese.”��

For many of the CNAs in the program, the experience marked their first exposure to any dementia-specific training. Mannix suggested that the sessions provided a sense of validation. “Their ideas were valuable, and they were able to help shape the future of this study.”��

Chen and her team are now analyzing feedback, with plans to present their findings at the in November. They’re also working to refine the VR content and training materials, in hopes of expanding the program in the future to additional care facilities.��

Chen sees VR not as a silver bullet, but one tool to support more thoughtful training. Her framework rests upon,�� which prioritizes empathy, trust, and human connection.��

“It’s about understanding the person, and building a connection that’s beyond client and provider,” she said.��

��Chen’s project is supported by two grants:����

• George �鶹��Ƶ College of Public Health Pilot Award (2025-2026): Relationship-Centered Care for Formal and Informal Caregivers of Persons Living with Dementia: VR and Multi-modal Approaches.����

• Geriatric Training and Education (GTE) Initiative at the Virginia Center of Aging (2024-2025): Immersive Training: Enhancing Relationship-Centered Care in Nursing Homes through VR��