Autonomic Nervous System Assessment Based on HRV Analysis During Virtual Reality Serious Games

The virtual reality serious game in the field of physical rehabilitation are mentioned as complementary tools to assure highly motivated training for patients that are following a physical rehabilitation plan. Different virtual reality (VR) serious game framework is reported and different interface that provide information dynamic and kinematic parameters associated with the user body motion during training are reported in literature. Physical training affect not only the patient motor condition but is also reflected on the level of cardiac and respiratory activity. Taking into account the necessity to monitor the health status of patient during the training, reflected on the level of autonomous nervous system, the paper provides information about relevant works presented in the literature that sought to explore the effects of virtual reality exergaming on autonomic nervous responses based on wearable sensor data. The contributions of serious exergames on physical performance, and on rehabilitation processes has also been addressed. Particular contributions focus on heart rate variability (HRV) changes in younger adults while experiencing VR serious gaming of different time durations and exercise intensity. Moreover, the application of artificial intelligence algorithms to classify the VR serious game intensity levels is also presented.