Enhancing Medical Anatomy Education through Virtual Reality (VR): Design, Development, and Evaluation

Modern medicine demands innovations in medical education, particularly in the learning of human anatomy, traditionally taught through textbooks, dissections, and lectures. Virtual Reality (VR) has emerged as a promising tool to address the limitations of these conventional methods by emphasising vision-based and active learning. However, current VR educational tools are often inaccessible due to high costs and specialised equipment requirements. This paper details the design and development of an accessible, desktop-based VR system aimed at enhancing anatomy education by leveraging the user's visual perception to promote a meaningful and interactive learning experience. The Virtual Anatomy Lab was designed to enable students to interact with a 3D Skull model to complete tasks virtually via an interactive user interface (UI) with the help of common devices like a mouse and keyboard. As part of the study, a group of medical students from prestigious medical schools throughout Malaysia were invited to evaluate the built system to offer feedback and determine its overall efficiency and usability in fulfilling their learning goals. The results and findings from user evaluations were then analysed to discuss its effectiveness and areas for future improvement.