OCD and Virtual Reality

According to the American Psychiatric Association, the obsessive compulsive disorder is an anxiety disorder in which people have undesirable thoughts, ideas or sensations (obsessions), which carry out ritualized behaviors (compulsions) or repetitive thoughts (neutralizations). These behaviors, such as washing hands, checking or cleaning, interfere in a significant way with the daily activities and social relationships of a person. (Gorrindo, T., Parekh, R., 2015)

For OCD’s differential diagnosis obsessions and/or compulsions that consume a lot of time (more than one daily hour), cause stress, harm work and social relationships, as well as other important areas must be present. (APA, 2007). The cognitive-behavioral therapy, the treatment with medication, apart from other somatic therapies of cerebral stimulation, have been until now the most effective alternatives to treat this disorder (APA, 2007).

Virtual Reality appears as a good alternative tool to the traditional techniques used in mental disorder treatments and in obsessive compulsive disorders among others. Virtual Reality allows the standardization and the control on the parameters of the exposure sessions. Likewise, it turns out to be very useful to repeat the exposure to the fear or anxiogenic situations as many times as necessary, making the customization and flexibilization of the therapeutic process much easier.

Psious’s environments allow the use of diverse psychological intervention techniques: exposure, cognitive restructuring, systematic desensitization, training in social skills… Use the most adapted characteristics of the patient and use those with major empirical support to obtain better results.