Pilot Study of Virtual Reality for Providing Exposure Therapy to Children

Twenty children with generalized anxiety disorder (perfectionism) who have received less than 3 treatment sessions and a parent will be recruited to pilot the Virtual Reality system. Participants will be identified through the Mayo Clinic Pediatric Anxiety Disorders Clinic (PADC) using purposive sampling methods. Each patient will participate in a single (up to) 2-hour visit, allowing for breaks as needed. Staff from Mayo Clinic HealthCare Policy & Research experienced in qualitative data analysis and not involved with the patients' medical care or development of the prototype system will conduct the study visits. During the first 30 minutes the patient and parent will be introduced to the Virtual Reality system and the rationale for this feasibility study. Next, a therapist from the PADC, all of whom are experienced exposure therapists, will lead the patient through exposure exercises using the Virtual Reality system for up to 30 minutes. During the next period, up to 30 minutes, the therapist will go to a different room and the patient, with support from their parent, will complete exposure exercises using the Virtual Reality system that the therapist directed them to complete. During the exposures the interviewer will observe, code and record the patient's interaction with the Virtual Reality system. The data from the Virtual Reality system will be automatically transmitted to a cloud service running on a local laptop to study the effectiveness of the system's automatic logging capabilities. For the remaining time (up to 30 minutes) the interviewer will interview the patient about his or her experience with the Virtual Reality system and then will ask for observations and opinions from the parent.