Virtual reality; the concept is amazing as it sounds. The emergence of virtual reality has amazed the world due to its extraordinary applications. It is already doing wonders and is being used in many different ways.
Are you curious to know what virtual reality actually is and how it can help with certain treatments? What about VR for anxiety, and what are the VR therapies? In this blog, we will not just clear all of these queries but also will tell you a lot more about VR. So, without any further delay, let’s begin.
How It Works – What Is Virtual Reality Rehabilitation?
As claimed by some as the future of Physical therapy, virtual reality rehabilitation threatens to rule out traditional physical therapy. The reason behind its potential success is that it’s not dull and boring like traditional physical therapy. But how does it actually work? Let’s get to know it.
VR is used for the treatment of brain injury and post-stroke patients. VR allows the patients to perform certain actions in the virtual world that they can’t perform in the real world. As a result, the imagination power of the patients improves, and they can overcome their disability quite quickly.
Virtual Reality Therapy Plunges Patients Back Into Trauma
You may be asking yourself, is VR good for PTSD, or can VR give PTSD? Dr. Difede and Dr. Hunter Hoffman at the Virtual Reality Research Center at the University of Washington have tested VR on a patient with acute PSTD after the World trade center terrorist attack.
When therapy was started, it’s said that the patient started to cry as she remembered the traumatic incident.
However, after only 6 hours of sessions, there was a 90% decrease in PSTD symptoms. Dr. Difede says that 90% of patients don’t show any signs of PSTD after the VR treatment. So, overall, VR is turning out to be a great way to treat trauma therapy.
Health Benefits Of Virtual Reality
Virtual reality has been around for many years now and has improved many fields, including health. Here are the key health benefits of VR.
Pain Relief
Some of the innovative VR techniques have been shown to decrease pain due to injuries or different conditions.
Now, even some countries are using VR in maternity wards to reduce the pain of childbirth and contractions.
Helping the Admitted Patients
VR helps to entertain and calm the patients. After be‐ ing admitted to the hospital, patients start to feel boredom and lonely. They also miss their home and their family.
In this scenario, VR can come to the rescue. A few hospitals in the US have now introduced VR to eliminate the stress and anxiety of the patients. It allows them to enter a different world and relish some joyful moments. This technique ultimately results in a speedy recovery.
Fighting Phobias
As the VR makes people believe what they are seeing is real so it can help them get rid of their phobias. Suppose that someone has a height phobia.
Now, they can’t practice conquering this fear by going to the top of buildings. They will simply end up falling down. But, with VR, they can beat their fear quite conveniently and safely as well.
What Disorder Can Virtual Reality Treat?
Virtual reality is still a relatively new subject, and a lot of research is going on about it. Different techniques are being used to make it more effective and more diverse to be used. At the moment, virtual reality therapy is used to treat a number of disorders like:
- Phobias
- Stress
- Anxiety
- Eating disorders
- Psychosis
- PTSD
- Social anxiety
- Schizophrenia
- Depression
- Autism
Experience On Demand What Virtual Reality Is, How It Works And What It Can Do?
Well, don’t get baffled after reading the heading. It’s just the name of the book written by Jeremy Bailenson. The book is the result of roughly 20 years of Jeremy’s in-depth research about the upsides and downsides of VR for humans.
In the book, he has given highly precise guidelines for interacting with VR and explains how this technology can help us enhance our performance.
He also tells us how we can use it for better learning and treating different psychological issues like trauma. According to the author, Virtual reality can blur the fine line between imagination and reality.
If you are interested in reading this masterpiece, you can order it here.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can virtual reality cause anxiety?
Virtual reality does not cause anxiety, but it can trigger anxiety to help treat it.
What is virtual reality psychology?
It is the application of virtual reality to treat psychological traumas or phobias.
The virtual reality of emotions in the workplace: how do emotions impact workplace cyberbullying?
Cyberbullying can have serious impacts on the mental health of an individual. It can cause issues like anxiety, stress, low self-esteem, and isolation. Virtual therapy is used to treat these issues.
Final Words
The applications of virtual reality in the health field are quite tremendous but still new to the table. The world needs time to accept its applications, but once it’s done, it will bring an extraordinary change to the world of health sciences.
Here, we have presented to you virtual reality, why some it plunges, and virtual reality, why swear it therapy? We also introduced you to the concepts of virtual reality rehabilitation and told you about virtual reality and why some of it plunges.
We hope that this content cleared all your confusion regarding VR. If there are any more, feel free to ask in the comment section.
