At the microphone of "Sans Rendez-vous", psychiatrist Eric Malbos discusses the benefits of virtual reality as part of psychotherapy to treat a phobia or put an end to an addiction.

Called virtual reality exposure therapy (TERV), this technique is particularly successful in quitting smoking. 

INTERVIEW

What if the virtual could help overcome very real evils?

In any case, this is a certainty for some 1,000 health professionals in France, Belgium and Switzerland, who use virtual reality to overcome the tocs, phobias and other addictions of their patients.

An evolution that seems natural since in any cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) there is a phase where a patient is faced with his fear, or his temptation.

But "to put for example a patient who is afraid of dogs in front of a real dog, it's still very brutal and very hard", explains Eric Malbos, author of 

Psychotherapy and virtual reality, 

published by Odile Jacob.

So this is where virtual therapy comes in.

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Being gradually confronted with your addiction or fear

With virtual reality exposure therapy (TERV), it is possible to proceed step by step, adds to the microphone of "Sans Rendez-vous" this psychiatrist and teacher-researcher at the CHU Conception at the Assistance Publique Hospitals of Marseille (AP -HM).

"As with all learning, you don't throw a child into the ocean to learn to swim. You have to take it slow."

So that in the case of a patient who has a phobia of airplanes, the virtual environment makes it possible to start by making the person sit in an empty and perfectly still plane, before gradually putting on the throttle to make him live virtually a real flight thanks to the virtual reality headset.

"A Paris-Los Angeles in 30 minutes", laughs the psychiatrist.

And to "accentuate the immersion" in the case of a panic fear of turbulence, it is even possible to add a vibrating chair.

"The idea is to feel present in an environment that does not exist to provoke the same emotions" and to control them through classic CBT techniques such as emotion management or relaxation.

A method which has proven itself and which even proves "more effective than CBT according to several metanalyses", argues Eric Malbos. 

"72% of smoking patients have not relapsed"

Especially since the TERV also works for addictions: "72% of smoking patients have not relapsed", thus indicates the specialist, author of 

Psychotherapy and virtual reality, 

published by Odile Jacob.

"It also works very well for addiction to alcohol, heroin, cocaine ..." The principle remains the same: "we expose patients to environments of temptation (rave party, nightclub , coffee break at work ...) ".

In the case of a smoker who wishes to quit, "we raise the urge so that he knows what to do when it arrives". 

And if the latter is too strong, the patient can even interact and take a virtual cigarette thanks to "controllers", joysticks.

"They have the impression of really smoking", assures Eric Malbos, who slips that several of his patients confided to him to have even "the sensation of smelling the smell of tobacco".

Despite its effectiveness, TERV is not intended for everyone.

"Patients must be turned towards the present or the future to free themselves from something", indicates the specialist.

Otherwise, "it is better to go see a psychoanalyst".