IEEE Consumer Electronics Magazine - July/August 2023 - 39

responsible healthcare provider will request an
emergency session to diagnose the patient's condition.
In addition, in the case of uncertainty about a
patient's condition, assistance, and collaboration
can be requested from other healthcare providers
who have access to themetaverse. The second use
case of the metaverse is for services provided by
local healthcare providers, where the physical
presence of the patient is required. In this particular
use case, the metaverse is used if the available
healthcare provider is incompetent and incapable
of providing the patient with the required treatment
and the transfer of the patient to a capable
healthcare provider or bringing experienced
healthcare professionals is not possible. For example,
robotic surgery can be performed by an experienced
healthcare professional remotely via
metaverse. Furthermore, the results of a radiology
session can be inspected virtually to infer findings.
The performance of such an application can
be further improved by the use of AI, where the
created 3D avatars of users and objects are
enhanced. In addition, interactions with nonhuman
characters in the metaverse are enhanced
by utilizing NLP techniques. Moreover, the data
stored in the cloud server are used to train ML
models, which improves the performance of the
metaverse and brings it closer to human-like
behavior. Another technology that is used to
improve the performance of the metaverse is
blockchain, where critical data are permanently
stored on the blockchain to ensure that it is
always accessible and secure even if the cloud
server suffers from a security breach.
Medical Education and Training
During the COVID-19 pandemic, working and
studying remotely gradually became the social
norm. However, in medical education and training,
the findings of recent surveys revealed that
the majority of medical students perceived that
COVID-19 had a negative impact on their education
and training.31 The adaptations to the
COVID-19 pandemic have reduced trainees' experiences
in medical procedures, such as surgical
procedures, which caused a major educational
disruption.32,33 It is evident from these findings
that major efforts are needed to improve the
existing remote education and training solutions
so that medical students are able to extend their
July/August 2023
experience even through such difficulties. Therefore,
it is worth examining the potential the metaverse
holds to overcome such challenges, as it is
capable of providing medical students with an
immersive experience via accessibility equipment,
such as VR/AR headsets, which can virtually
place students and trainers in an operating
room, where they can practice and exchange
experience. In addition, the performance of students
and trainers can be stored and recorded
for further analysis, which can help them identify
their weaknesses and strengths. Moreover, students
and trainers from different geographical
locations are able to collaborate with each other
in a virtual environment, which allows them to
broaden their experience.
Medical Marketing
It can be argued that a successful adaptation
to metaverse-based healthcare is expected to significantly
increase the number of customers who
virtually explore the metaverse, which presents a
unique opportunity for healthcare product companies
to market their products in an unprecedented
way. The immersiveness of the metaverse
enables marketers to virtually design and showcase
their products to customers because they
are physically produced, which reduces costs and
provides a more engaging experience for both the
marketers and customers. Moreover, the virtual
environment in which products are designed
allows marketers to receive real-time feedback
from the immersed customers, which helps them
identify their needs and demands. In addition,
healthcare awareness campaigns can be organized
virtually in the metaverse, where the targeted
audience is made aware of certain medical
conditions by virtually introducing them to
healthcare experts and even patients with those
medical conditions, so that they better understand
the magnitude of the condition and its
seriousness. Furthermore, the utilization of the
underlying technologies of the metaverse can further
broaden the impact of virtual marketing. For
example, AI technology can be leveraged to produce
advanced analysis based on the interaction
between marketers and consumers, which adds
another layer to the understanding of consumers'
preferences and demands. Moreover, blockchain
technology can be utilized to represent products
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IEEE Consumer Electronics Magazine - July/August 2023

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