VR Therapy

VR Therapy for Mental Health Rewires the Brain

 Let us consider a case involving paralyzing acrophobia. In conventional therapy, there exist just two methods – imagining the experience or going through the actual thing in real-life which is very costly and difficult to implement. However, in the same scenario, let us see what happens when they put on their VR gear and ride a virtual glass elevator for 50 floors. Their heart pounds; beads of sweat form because of their successes. But they are standing safely on a carpet floor in an office building. VR technology takes exposure therapy into another dimension. And in fact, it is one of the most successful treatments for internal health conditions in recent decades. VR therapy is not anymore fiction.

Rewiring the Brain Through Virtual Presence

 The brilliance in VR therapy is capture in a quip about the brain that it considers an enriching virtual reality experience to be true reality. For example, when a patient with arachnophobia views an artificial spider approaching them in a VR environment, the amygdala reacts as if it is reacting to an actual tarantula. This enables therapists to trigger the fear response in a controlled way which would otherwise be impossible to do in an office environment. The therapist is able to gradually increase the levels of stimuli from a spider moving far away to one sitting on top of their shoulders all while engaging the patient in relaxation techniques.

A Breakthrough Treatment for PTSD

Prolonged exposure treatment for PTSD has long involved the act of encouraging sufferers to talk about their trauma. This is an extremely painful process that often leads to the sufferer dropping out of the program. VR exposure treatment takes the entire process into another realm altogether. With combat survivors, apps such as Brave mind create the same environment as the thoroughfares of Iraq and Afghanistan, complete with realistic visuals and even sounds and smells. In conjunction with the therapist, the victim revisits the experience of the trauma in small doses. A recent study published in The Lancet Psychiatry showed that the VR treatment program significantly lowered the symptoms of PTSD by over 50 percent among active-duty service members – the findings being equal or better than conventional treatments.

How VR Therapy Helps Reduce Pain and Anxiety

Perhaps the most astonishing procedure is that of the pain procedure. Victims of burns who see excellent treatment – a painful procedure – are being provided VR goggles displaying icy landscapes or frozen valleys. This helps to reduce pain perception by more than 50 percent as our brain’s capacity to pay attention limit. It’s much easier for your mind to deal with sledding down a virtual snowy landscape than having the resources for receiving pain signals.

Challenges Facing VR Therapy

Virtual reality treatment cannot be equate with some kind of miracle cure-all. Quality headsets are precious even today for small events. Cases of cyber sickness occur occasionally. Although the tool is crucial, but it needs a professional therapist too. However, the boundary is clearly demarcate here. As stand-alone headsets are coming down in price along with FDA-approved VR applications for regular low back pain and postpartum depression, a whole new paradigm of pharmaceutical VR solutions is being born. The waiting room is getting replace by a virtual waiting room. For millions who suffer from anxiety, phobias, and traumas, the virtual waiting room presents an opportunity where conventional treatment fails.