The "Specific Fear Psychological Rehabilitation Training Software" jointly developed by the Shanghai Mental Health Center and a medical technology company was officially approved by the People's Republic of China for Class II Medical Device Registration Certificate recently. This is the first approved specific fear rehabilitation training software based on VR (virtual reality) devices in China, and the world's first medical device suitable for specific phobias (fear of heights). The Paper's reporter learned the news from the Shanghai Mental Health Center on March 8.
China's first approved specific fear rehabilitation software based on VR (virtual reality) devices. The pictures in this article are all provided by the Shanghai Mental Health Center
Wang Zhen, vice president of the Shanghai Mental Health Center, said that the global lifetime prevalence of specific phobias represented by fear of heights is 3%-15%, common in children, adolescents or early adulthood, if not timely intervention, the disease can last for years or decades, and increase the risk of other mental disorders. At present, in the clinical treatment of specific phobias, the efficacy of drugs is limited, and the effect of psychotherapy is the most significant.
The study found that VR scenes combined with traditional psychotherapy can significantly improve avoidance, high cognitive judgment and clinical anxiety symptoms in patients with fear of heights. In the "Specifications for the Diagnosis and Treatment of Mental Disorders (2020 Edition)", the National Health Commission has listed desensitization and exposure therapy based on VR technology as one of the psychotherapeutic treatment methods for specific phobias, including fear of heights.
A picture of the patient's effect during treatment.
The design idea of the approved "specific fear psychological rehabilitation training software" is to build a virtual situation that can induce patient anxiety and expose the patient to stimuli, through the guidance of psychiatrists or professional psychotherapists, to help patients identify the maladaptive cognition that induces and maintain fear, to combat avoidance responses, so that individuals can produce more realistic and reasonable evaluations and ideas, and then gradually reduce symptoms with natural decline in anxiety or relaxation training.
Previously, the expert group led by Professor Wang Zhen conducted multi-party demonstration of the clinical feasibility of the product in the early research and development stage, and carried out a series of basic and clinical scientific research work, after undergoing registration inspection, scientific research verification, clinical evaluation, system verification, expert review and other aspects of the review, the "specific fear psychological rehabilitation training software" finally officially obtained China's first specific fear psychological rehabilitation training software medical device registration license in February 2022.
"The 'Specific Fear Psychological Rehabilitation Training Software' developed by the medical technology company is the first class II medical device product successfully transformed and approved by the Shanghai Mental Health Center, and it is also the first attempt of cooperation between the two sides in the field of mental health, and it is also inseparable from the R&D and transformation platform of the Shanghai Intelligent Psychological Assessment and Intervention Engineering Technology Research Center." Wang Zhen said that the approval of the specific fear psychological rehabilitation training software has truly realized the combination of VR technology and clinical diagnosis and treatment, and provided a standardized service program for the exposure therapy of patients with fear of heights.
VR scenes
Professor Xie Bin, Secretary of the Party Committee of the Shanghai Mental Health Center, said that in the future, the Shanghai Mental Health Center will continue to focus on the "unmet" clinical needs, continue to promote industry-university-research cooperation with science and technology enterprises, and jointly research, develop and transform various innovative diagnosis and treatment products for common mental illnesses such as anxiety, fear, compulsion and depression.