As online health visits become increasingly popular, physicians can sometimes find it challenging to conduct a musculoskeletal exam virtually, as they are unable to demonstrate what movements are required from their patients effectively via a screen.
Now, a physician from the University of Michigan Health C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital has come up with a simple, yet innovative solution for overcoming this challenge by demonstrating different joint movements with the help of a Barbie doll.
The perfect model
During a telehealth visit with her patients, Alecia Daunter, an assistant professor of pediatric inpatient rehabilitation medicine at U-M Health found that she often struggled to verbally describe to a patient how she wanted them to move their body for a virtual examination. This breakdown in communication not only reduced the quality of the consultation, but it also left her frustrated due to the poor use of time. In order to demonstrate more clearly the movements she wanted her patients to perform, Daunter used a Barbie doll that was sitting on her desk as a visual aid. As this version of the iconic Barbie includes a wheelchair and is able to bend at most of her joints, she provides the perfect model to demonstrate the joint movements required of patients during a musculoskeletal exam.
Due to the overwhelming success Daunter achieved with her patients using the Barbie doll, she was encouraged to study the method further to see if it could potentially help other physicians.
So, together with Alyssa Cook, a physical medicine and rehabilitation resident at U-M Health, she conducted a study on two groups of pediatric patients ranging from 4 to 17 years in age. In total, 30 children, together with their parents, participated in the study, which was conducted via Zoom meetings.
Barbie as a visual aid
For the study, which was recently published in the scientific journal PM&R: The Journal of Injury, Function and Rehabilitation, Cook used a prewritten script to verbally guide the control group through a set of movements for a physical examination without using the Barbie doll as a visual aid to demonstrate these movements. The second group of children were read the same script while Cook demonstrated the movements they wanted the patients to perform using the Barbie doll.
Once the physical examinations of all the children had been conducted virtually via Zoom, Daunter together with co-author Britney Papp, a former pediatric physical medicine and rehabilitation fellow at U-M Health, analyzed the individual video recordings to assess the time it took to complete each examination in its entirety, whether all the required movements were performed correctly, and how many times each participant required verbal input to help them complete each maneuver correctly.
According to Cook, although they always completed the session, when conducting a physical examination without using the Barbie doll as a visual aid to demonstrate what was required of the patients, the patients, as well as their parents and herself often found it frustrating when patients were not clear what movements they were required to perform. On the other hand, Cook found that when she used the Barbie doll as a visual aid, she was able to explain what movements they needed to see the patients perform more easily, and the patients quickly understood what maneuvers were required.
Barbie enhances the patient experience
When patients were surveyed after the Zoom call was completed, all participants from the group where the Barbie doll was used as a visual aid indicated that the Barbie enhanced their experience and gave them a clearer understanding of how the movements needed to be performed.
From the physician’s point of view, the use of the Barbie doll didn’t necessarily save any time, but didn’t make the appointments any longer either. They found that when using the Barbie doll, they had to offer fewer verbal prompts to participants to help them successfully complete the examination.
Daunter and Cook believe that using a visual aid can benefit patients and healthcare providers when conducting virtual physical examinations that require patients to demonstrate body movements during a telehealth visit. This applies to both young and older patients, and the visual aid is not limited to a Barbie doll; it can be any action figure or moveable mannequin that is able to demonstrate the movements effectively required for the examination.
Innovative solutions
While telehealth has proven to be a marvelous tool for expanding healthcare, it does have some limitations. As it continues to grow, innovative solutions such as the use of a simple Barbie doll as a visual aid are helping telehealth to adapt and evolve, ensuring patients continue to receive high-quality care from the comfort of their homes.
Tapestry Health, a leader in virtual health services, offers a wide range of innovative telehealth solutions, including 24/7 telemedicine care, AI powered solutions, and remote technologies that improve primary health care, chronic care management, and vital sign management.