Responsible design and assessment of a SARS-CoV virtual reality rehabilitation programme: guidance ethics in context

In many digital health technologies, the design does not align with the needs and values of users within a specific healthcare context. This results in low uptake of these technologies. Health technology assessments should encourage successful technology adoption. Yet, its traditional focus on the cost-effectiveness of technology results in missing important qualitative insights. More recent initiatives to include qualitative outcomes in assessments generally remain too speculative to identify the actual effect of technology on individual needs and values. In this article, we adjust the ‘guidance ethics’ framework to study the lived value experiences of users while interacting with technology in context. We apply this novel framework in a case study of developing and evaluating a virtual reality rehabilitation service for long COVID patients. We end the article by evaluating the strengths and limitations of this novel framework as an addition to traditional health technology assessments.