Innovative Solutions Sherry Law Uses Virtual Reality in Long-Term Care Homes

Counselling therapist Sherry Law is combining virtual reality and therapy to aid New Brunswick seniors.

The inspiration for her company, Innerva Virtual, came to her after her grandmother, who lived in Hong Kong, fell ill in 2013.

That winter, as Law scrambled to help her parents rebook cancelled flights back to Hong Kong during a series of snowstorms, she started thinking about the densely populated environment her grandmother was living in.

“I felt helpless in that moment, so I very quickly started merging the idea of assistive tech for senior care,” she said.

“I started wondering, what could happen with mental health if I were to put my grandmother on a virtual beach right now? That was the beginning of my direction in merging health and technology.”

Law realized many seniors in New Brunswick could benefit from her idea. After completing her Master of Education in Counselling at the University of New Brunswick, she started approaching long-term care homes to continue her research. Law partnered with York Care Centre and received funding from The Centre for Aging and Brain Health Innovation and the New Brunswick Health Research Foundation.

While conducting her research on mental health and virtual reality, Law recognized other gaps in the healthcare system for long-term care centres, like fall prevention and dementia screening, and started to think about how virtual reality could be used to address those problems.

“The moment a senior takes a fall, it impacts their confidence and their willingness and readiness to partake in social events, so they start hiding out because of the shame and because the healing process is prolonged as you’re aging. All these factors ricochet in the life of a senior the moment they take a fall.”

Innerva Virtual is still in the research and development stage, Law said, but the software platform she is building has been supported through various start-up grants.

While her work at Innerva Virtual progresses, Law is taking on a new challenge as President of the College of Counselling Therapists of New Brunswick, the regulatory body for therapists in the province.

She is excited to grow the community of licensed counsellors and plans to bring her unique expertise and interests into this new role.

“Since COVID, there’s been an uptick of technology used for remote meetings and collaboration, and I find that a lot of counselling therapists feel outside of their scope when it comes to anything tech-related. I can set standards of what counsellors need to know and provide them information and training in these areas.”

Law said following her passions has allowed her to create a nonconventional career.

“I’m interested in things like cryptocurrency and VR computers. I’m a co-captain of an e-sports team. I was able to create these programs and initiatives on my own because I was following passions and I was following my values. I did not wait for permission.” •

by Jacqueline Cormier, BA’08