Patient Data and Privacy in the Realm of Extended Reality: A Digital Health Perspective

The post-COVID-19 era has witnessed a wave of change in the generic patient-doctor interactions. Healthcare systems have been embedded with multi-layered technologies in compliance with the Sustainable Development Goals of the World Health Organization. The transformation towards technology adaptation is seen across an array of interconnected and interoperable systems, which includes tele-consultancy (including telemedicine), application of Internet of Things-based devices, digital diagnostics, digital therapeutics, mobile health applications (mHealth), electronic health applications (eHealth), clinical decision support systems, and technologies such as augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR), mixed reality (MR); all of which fall within the purview of extended reality (XR). The present study focuses on data privacy in the context of XR-based applications in healthcare. The study presents findings from a scoping review encompassing all the existing policies in this area of specialization. The study also carries out an extensive risk assessment of the existing policy frameworks for XR-based applications in healthcare and proposes the need for privacy impact assessment at micro/macro levels. The study offers an evidence-based approach to developing a framework for data privacy in the context of XR-based applications, which will enable policy-makers, researchers, and academia to have a fresh perspective on data privacy.