Virtual reality therapy contolled study for war veterans with PTSD. Preliminary results
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1
Universidade Lusófona de Humanidades e Tecnologia, Portugal
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2
APOIAR, Portugal
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3
University of Salford, United Kingdom
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4
(TIMENDI), Portugal
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5
ISCTE, Portugal
More than 30 years after signing truces, there are still around 20.000 Portuguese war veterans that fill PTSD (Posttraumatic Stress Disorder) diagnose criteria. Despite many of them attended to therapy, the outcome is not cheerful. In this way, a research protocol was devised to investigate the opportunity of adopting virtual reality exposure therapy (VRET) to reduce PTSD symptomathology. This protocol consists on a controlled study (VRET vs traditional psychotherapy vs waiting list), where in the VRET condition patients will be graded expose to a virtual reality jungle scenario. The activating episodes, that comprised three cues (ambush, mortar blasting and waiting for injured rescue), are repeated 3 times each session. Cues’ intensity and frequency increase from session to session. Patients are exposed to the VR world through a HMD (Head Mounted Display). This paper reports on this ongoing research where 4 VRET patients that filled CAPS DSM-IV PTSD criteria were assessed at pretreatment and at the middle of treatment (5th session). Results from IES and SCL-90R dimensions showed no statistical significant differences between assessments, with exception to obsession-compulsion dimension of SCL-90R (F(1; 3) = 21.235; p < .05), indicating a decrease in obsessive thoughts. However, through descriptive analysis it was observed a reduction in all IES and SCL-90R dimensions, except for hostility and psychoticism of SCL-90R.
Conference:
Annual CyberTherapy and CyberPsychology 2009 conference, Villa Caramora, Italy, 21 Jun - 23 Jun, 2009.
Presentation Type:
Poster Presentation
Topic:
Abstracts
Citation:
Gamito
P,
Oliveira
J,
Morais
D,
Oliveira
S,
Duarte
N,
Saraiva
T,
Pombal
M and
Rosa
P
(2009). Virtual reality therapy contolled study for war veterans with PTSD. Preliminary results.
Front. Neuroeng.
Conference Abstract:
Annual CyberTherapy and CyberPsychology 2009 conference.
doi: 10.3389/conf.neuro.14.2009.06.036
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Received:
19 Mar 2009;
Published Online:
19 Mar 2009.
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Correspondence:
Pedro Gamito, Universidade Lusófona de Humanidades e Tecnologia, Lisbon, Portugal, pedro.gamito@ulusofona.pt