Optimizing Non-invasive Wellness Care for Maximum Impact: Multisensory Meditation Environments Promote Wellbeing

Abstract

Public health models of wellness care embracing holistic models of mental health are currently needed that are, protocol-driven and have the capacity for standardization without losing a personalized human-centred intention and execution. Increasing evidence is pointing towards the health benefits of leisure: freely chosen, intrinsically motivated and self-directed states, often environment-directed and quite probably with the potential to enact potent changes of consciousness. Our group has been exploring the phenomena of immersive induced Leisure and Wellbeing in clinical and research endeavours in recent years, allowing for optimized development of both therapeutics and diagnostics to support these efforts. This update offers a review of our optimized wellness care, designed for maximum effectiveness and minimal invasiveness. Optimal leisure experiences are thought to result in enhanced mental wellbeing, positive affect and transformational learning states that carry over into effectively coping with daily routines, stresses and roles. Our group has developed and researched the medically supervised administration of standardized simulated leisure-state meditation experiences in the context of pleasant, hedonic sensory input incorporating multiple sensory channels (visual, auditory, haptic) to promote broad-spectrum wellbeing in mental health care. In this brief report, we report on a novel clinical mental health methodology: TEMM- a technology-enhanced multimodal meditation stress-reduction program with a broad-spectrum mental health benefit, analogous to conventional Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) programs, and a therapeutic risk-benefit margin possibly superior and often preferred by patients to medication therapy attending the PRAXIS holistic health centre. We touch upon seamless diagnostic evaluation and clinical utility of Wellpad, our Electronic Medical Record (EMR) system developed using an iterative Inclusive Design approach. We place our multisensory TEMM meditation therapy within the scope of Virtual Environment Therapy (VET) and suggest the mechanism of action as an induced leisure or flow state to potentiate relaxation, stress-reduction, resilience and personal transformation. The relevance of leisure states to wellbeing and specifically positive experiential learning through inspirational/motivational shifts in consciousness delivered via multimodal immersive environments are described as an important health promotion avenue to pursue and the public mental health research community to consider as new improved, paradigms are developed, aimed at maximizing efficacy and cost-efficiency while minimizing iatrogenic outcomes.