FRESNO (KMJ) – Fighting PTSD with virtual reality.
Researchers are testing a new therapy to speed the recovery from post-traumatic stress disorder – a condition that causes people to feel threatened even though they’re out of danger.
First-responders, police and the military are often more likely to struggle with it.
JoAnn Difede, Ph.D., the Director of the Program for Anxiety and Traumatic Stress, Weill Cornell Medicine and NewYork-Presbyterian, is developing a type of exposure therapy using virtual reality.
Participants navigate through a number of computer-generated environments that are personalized to fit a stressful situation from their past.
So what may look like an overpass to most people could look like a sniper hotbed to a military veteran.
The scenario is repeated during a 90 minute session, once a week, for nine weeks.
Researchers say the idea of the treatment is to teach the person, and their brain, that those cues aren’t scary anymore, and nothing bad is going to happen.
