Objective: To systematically evaluate the effect of virtual reality technology-based nursing interventions to improve cognitive function, quality of life, activity of daily living, and negative emotions in patients with dementia.

Methods: Computer searches of the VIP Chinese Science and Technology Journal Database, China National Knowledge Infrastructure Database, Wanfang Database, The Cochrane Library, Embase, PubMed, and Web of Science were conducted to include randomized controlled trials and class experimental studies of virtual reality technology-based nursing interventions for patients with dementia, with a search time frame from the date of database creation to March 31, 2023. Two investigators independently screened the literature according to inclusion and exclusion criteria, extracted data, performed risk bias evaluation, and then performed Meta-analysis on the extracted relevant data using Rev Man 5.4 software.

Results: A total of 6 randomized controlled trials and 2 quasi-randomized controlled trial with 514 patients with dementia were included. Meta-analysis results showed that compared with conventional cognitive care interventions, virtual reality-based care interventions significantly improved cognitive function [MD = 1.61, 95% CI (0.99, 2.23), Z = 5.12, P < 0.00001], quality of life [SMD = 0.85, 95% CI (0.56, 1.14), Z = 5.70, P < 0.00001] and activity of daily living [MD = 3.75, 95% CI (1.22, 6.28), Z = 2.91, P = 0.004], and alleviate negative emotions [MD = -4.00, 95% CI (-7.26, -0.75), Z = 2.41, P = 0.02].

Conclusions: The current results suggest that virtual reality-based nursing interventions have a positive effect on improving cognitive function, quality of life, activities of daily living and alleviating negative emotions in patients with dementia. Due to the limitations of the quantity and quality of the included literature, the above findings are yet to be validated by more high-quality studies.