AI-Enhanced Virtual Reality in Medicine: A Comprehensive Survey
Yixuan Wu Kaiyuan Hu Danny Z. Chen Jian Wu
With the rapid advance of computer graphics and artificial intelligence
technologies, the ways we interact with the world have undergone a
transformative shift. Virtual Reality (VR) technology, aided by artificial
intelligence (AI), has emerged as a dominant interaction media in multiple
application areas, thanks to its advantage of providing users with immersive
experiences. Among those applications, medicine is considered one of the most
promising areas. In this paper, we present a comprehensive examination of the
burgeoning field of AI-enhanced VR applications in medical care and services.
By introducing a systematic taxonomy, we meticulously classify the pertinent
techniques and applications into three well-defined categories based on
different phases of medical diagnosis and treatment: Visualization Enhancement,
VR-related Medical Data Processing, and VR-assisted Intervention. This
categorization enables a structured exploration of the diverse roles that
AI-powered VR plays in the medical domain, providing a framework for a more
comprehensive understanding and evaluation of these technologies. To our best
knowledge, this is the first systematic survey of AI-powered VR systems in
medical settings, laying a foundation for future research in this
interdisciplinary domain.