Based on ancient techniques, mindfulness is a powerful psychological intervention/coping skill that has been shown to improve mood and reduce stress. Mindfulness involves bringing one’s attention into the present moment; bringing full awareness into present experiences on purpose and nonjudgmentally. Dialectical Behavioral Therapy® (DBT®) uses mindfulness to help patients learn valuable skills to overcome psychologically unhealthy thought processes and behaviors. Patients start by directing their attention towards simple perceptual stimuli (e.g., sights and sounds), without self-criticism. They later learn how to experience emotions, thoughts, and sensations while still being able to focus their attention on an activity. Unfortunately, many patients have attention deficits that make mindfulness challenging. Our team developed a new treatment that teaches patients mindfulness skills while they are in virtual reality. Immersive virtual reality involves wearing/looking into VR goggles as a window into a 3D simulation designed to make the patient feel “present” in the virtual world, as if the computer-generated world is a place they are visiting. One of the first patients to try this new technique was a 39-year-old male patient hospitalized with a traumatic spinal cord injury C4-5 resulting in quadriplegia and respiratory failure requiring trachiotomy (breathing through a hole in his throat) after falling out of 4 story building. He had severe depression, and anxiety symptoms.
Methods: The patient looked into VR goggles, and had the illusion of slowly “floating down” a river in virtual reality while listening to DBT® Mindfulness Skills training instructions. The patient filled out brief psychological ratings before and after each VR session, after four sessions.
Results: As predicted, the patient reported reductions in negative emotions after each VR DBT® Mindfulness session.
Conclusion: Results were encouraging. Additional research and development will be needed to determine whether VR DBT® Mindfulness Skills training leads to any long term improvements in outcome.
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