Abstract
Background: Substance Use Disorder (SUD) and behavioral addictions are common and require a multidisciplinary approach. New technologies like Virtual Reality could have the potential to improve assessment and treatment of these disorders.Objective: In the present paper, we therefore present an overview of Virtual Reality (Head Mounted Devices) in the field of addiction medicine for craving assessment and treatment.Method: We conducted a systematic review by querying PubMed database for the titles of articles published up to March 2019 with the terms [virtual] AND [addictive] OR [addiction] OR [substance] OR [alcohol] OR [cocaine] OR [cannabis] OR [opioid] OR [tobacco] OR [nicotine] OR [methamphetamine] OR [gaming] OR [gambling].Results: We screened 319 abstracts and analyzed 37 articles, dividing them into two categories, the first for assessment of cue reactivity (craving, psychophysiological response and attention to cue) and the second for intervention, each drug (nicotine, cocaine, alcohol, cannabis, gambling) being detailed within each category.Conclusions: This overview suggest that VR provide benefits in the assessment and treatment of substance use disorders and behavior addictions and achieve high levels of ecological validity. While, craving provocation in VR is effective across addiction disorders, treatments based exclusively on virtual exposure to drug related cues as shown heterogenous results.
Highlights
Substance Use Disorder (SUD) and behavioral addictions are prevalent in many countries (Degenhardt et al, 2017) and require a multidisciplinary approach
Nicotine addiction criteria were reported in 13 studies, using DSM 4 (Guze, 1995) and/or Fagerström Test for Nicotine Dependence criteria (Heatherton et al, 1991)
Virtual reality exposure was controlled by a randomized healthy control group in 2 studies (Traylor et al, 2011; Gamito et al, 2014)
Summary
Substance Use Disorder (SUD) and behavioral addictions are prevalent in many countries (Degenhardt et al, 2017) and require a multidisciplinary approach. Individuals diagnosed with SUD experience several relapses after interventions and a lower quality of life because of the chronic nature of these disorders (Degenhardt et al, 2017). Virtual reality (VR) is emerging as one of the technological keys, it is increasingly accessible, and easy-touse, and has recently attracted attention because of its potential utility for individuals with SUD (Carter and Tiffany, 1999). Substance Use Disorder (SUD) and behavioral addictions are common and require a multidisciplinary approach. New technologies like Virtual Reality could have the potential to improve assessment and treatment of these disorders
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