Virtual Natural Environments for Restoration and Rehabilitation in Healthcare
For over two decades, research and clinical projects have exploited Virtual Reality technologies in the treatment of numerous human conditions, from desensitisation régimes combating phobias to the use of distraction and exposure therapies for burns victi
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Virtual Natural Environments for Restoration and Rehabilitation in Healthcare Robert Stone, Charlotte Small, James Knight, Cheng Qian and Vishant Shingari
Abstract For over two decades, research and clinical projects have exploited Virtual Reality technologies in the treatment of numerous human conditions, from desensitisation régimes combating phobias to the use of distraction and exposure therapies for burns victims and those suffering from post-traumatic stress disorders. In contrast to previous “high-tech” interface and combat-oriented approaches to using VR in the psychological rehabilitation process, the present chapter advocates the use of virtual restorative environments (VREs)—the recreation of locations and scenes that, by virtue of their natural beauty and peacefulness, can significantly help to reduce the body’s reactivity to stress and restore cognitive or attentional capacities. The chapter also argues that VREs, suitably enhanced with more interactive and dynamic features, could offer significant benefits to patients in physical rehabilitation programmes. This is especially the case for amputees, for example, who, whilst awaiting the fitting of prosthetic limbs, could undertake competitive and motivational “virtual exercises”, thereby avoiding muscle atrophy and related reductions in residual limb capabilities. The report concludes that the exploitation of simulation technologies in psychological therapies is worthy of continued investigation, especially in the pursuit of enhancing patients’ recovery profiles following surgical procedures, from intensive care to the hospital recovery ward. VREs possess a range of important qualities, not least significant of which is real-time interaction and ease-of-editing, supporting the cost-effective generation of engaging and distributable scenarios that can be tailored relatively easily to meet the needs of individual patients.
R. Stone (*) · C. Small · J. Knight · C. Qian · V. Shingari Human Interface Technologies Team, University of Birmingham, Birmingham B15 2TT, UK e-mail: [email protected]
M. Ma et al. (eds.), Virtual, Augmented Reality and Serious Games for Healthcare 1, Intelligent Systems Reference Library 68, DOI: 10.1007/978-3-642-54816-1_24, © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2014
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24.1 Introduction Since the early part of the 1990s, when Virtual Reality (VR) technologies made their inaugural appearances on the world’s information technology stage, there have been many attempts to develop a wide range of interactive 3D solutions to support medical and psychological interventions (e.g. [60, 62]). Even with the “fall from grace” of VR in the late 1990s and early 2000s (e.g. [58, 59]), the one application domain that has survived throughout—as conferences, dedicated journals and professional societies bear witness—is that of clinical, surgical and psychological medicine. As well as the early interest demonstrated during the 1990s in developing VR systems to support medical training and interventional planning (e.g.
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