Page 647 - Total War on PTSD

* To view some videos on this work please go to: http://www.youtube.com/user/ albertskiprizzo
Introduction
VR technology has undergone a transition in the last 20 years taking it from the realm of “expensive toy” into that of functional technology. These advances stand to offer new opportunities for clinical research, assessment, and intervention in the field of mental health and rehabilitation. Since the mid-1990s, VR-based testing, training, teaching, and treatment approaches have been developed by clinicians and researchers that would be difficult, if not impossible, to deliver using traditional methods. During this time, a large (but still maturing) scientific literature has evolved regarding the outcomes and effects from the use of what we now refer to as Clinical VR. Such VR simulation systems have targeted the assessment and treatment of cognitive, psychological, motor, and functional impairments across a wide range of clinical health conditions. Moreover, continuing advances in the underlying enabling technologies for creating and delivering VR applications have resulted in its widespread availability as a consumer product, sometimes at a very low cost.
The idea of using virtual reality to assess and treat the effects of medical conditions and pain is not new. VR first emerged in the late 1980s, and although the vision for its use clinically was sound, it did not take off then due to immature technology and prohibitive costs. With new more affordable VR equipment now
647 of 1063