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Use of VR (Oculus Rift, HTC VIVE, Playstation) in the Treatment of Traumatic Brain Injury

CircaRigel
Explorer
This may be rather lengthy, so please bear with me.  Basically, I'm discussing the use of Virtual Reality as a treatment option for Traumatic Brain injury.  I will provide evidence of its benefits in the form of links to scholarly articles at the end of this post.

I began considering VR when Amazon offered me an Alienware 15R3 to review a few weeks ago.  The system has the 7th generation i7 processor with up to 3.8 GHz turbo, and the GTX 1060 video card.  This is not something I would normally purchase, as it is far beyond my budget.  But I have it now, and I'd like to get the most out of it, if possible... particularly since I myself deal with the effects of traumatic brain injury (TBI).

Five years ago, I was involved in a serious bicycle accident.  Strong and shifting winds literally blew me off of Mount Evans, resulting in a 30+ foot drop onto granite boulders.  My helmet saved my life, but did not fully prevent TBI.  Other injuries included 9 spine fractures to my neck and upper back, a shattered scapula, a shattered rib cage, both lungs punctured, a small skull fracture, and a mangled kidney and spleen.

In spite of all of this, I've managed to make a remarkable recovery.  I had not been into gaming since I was a child (more than 30 years ago), but turned to it as a means of regaining some of my fine motor function in my hands... so I got a PS4, and quickly became hooked, playing games like the Uncharted series, Witcher 3, and The Last of Us, to name a few.

While my motor control has improved greatly, I continue to suffer deficits from the TBI.  The most annoying is an eye alignment issue that causes me double vision.  I also develop occasional myotonia (sometimes repetitive motions cause my hands to literally freeze in one position) and some minor speech issues when fatigued.  This is where I believe Virtual Reality offers, well, a number of virtues.

Unfortunately, like my computer, decent VR rigs are well beyond my budget.  I have written to Oculus, HTC, and Sony in hopes that they might sponsor me, particularly given my status as a top Amazon reviewer and how thorough I am when covering anything technical.  In addition, if I am able to overcome these remaining deficits, there is a good chance I will be able to at least return to biomedical research, if not medical school.  This would provide an opportune position for promotion of the system for medical use.

I have not heard a response from Oculus, HTC, or Sony with regard to my inquiries.  I was hoping you, as a community, might have some additional ideal about how I can turn this into a reality.
7 REPLIES 7

GATOxVoS
Heroic Explorer
I'm sorry to hear about your accident, but am glad to hear that you've been recovering, and seem to be in good spirits, seeing your dedication to this effort.

How long has it been since you've reached out to these companies? If it's been a while with no response from them, it might be a better idea to try a kickstarter/gofundme-esqe project to fund the purchase of a VR headset.

If you still wish to reach out to the companies, you may have to start posting on their social media sites and other places where people will see your story, and want to help. If a post/comment/idea reaches critical mass in a media setting, these companies will have much more incentive to listen to you/give you a headset.




My thoughts (disregard if want, I'm kind of being a downer):

I personally do not think that VR would be a great tool to improve your fine motor skills, as there are discrepancies in positioning with your VR hands and your irl hands (at least for Oculus Rift). If retraining/strengthening your motor coordination is what you wish to achieve in VR, I would think that these positional discrepancies could even harm your progress. (But, as a strict muscle strengthening tool, I think it would be fine).

With the other issues, such as your eye alignment. I don't know how well this would work in VR, as your eyes both have to be concentrated on the same point in the virtual space for the 3D effect to be present. I suppose it depends on how serious your eye alignment issue is though, because with the adjustment of the IPD, you may be able to widen the value to the point where it works for you.

Then again, this is all conjecture. I would be really interested in your results if and when you get your VR headset. 

PC Specs:
Intel i7-6700k @ 4.5 Ghz
Gigabyte Z170X-Gaming 3 Motherboard
RTX 2080 Ti - MSI VENTUS
16 GB CAS-10 RAM @ 2400 MHz
Startech 4-port/4-USB controller add-on card
850W Corsair HX850 PSU
4-Sensor, Roomscale Setup

CircaRigel
Explorer
I think you misunderstood me.  I've already managed to restore most of my fine motor skills via normal gaming and playing music on my keyboard, and do not intend to use VR to further that.  My thoughts on VR are that it will help the strabismus (eye alignment problems) caused by the traumatic brain injury, among other residual symptoms, and doing a search of scholarly articles on it has revealed that it is indeed beneficial for this.  My own initial thoughts, before searching for articles, were that it would help due to the direct ocular interface it uses.  It's very annoying, not to mention limiting, to get double vision to varying degrees, depending on my levels of fatigue, and doctors can't treat it due to its variable nature.

In fact, I have just contacted a researcher at UCSF doing a clinical trial utilizing VR in treating strabismus that is resistant to treatment with the use of prismatic eyeglasses. The study isn't recruiting yet, but I'm hoping to get on the list.  there are other studies I will be applying to as well that involve TBI and other issues I have, such as chronic pain and PTSD.

Here is just a sampling of the articles I found. (and my contact with the companies has been over the past 2 weeks)







TwoHedWlf
Expert Trustee
My thoughts on VR are that it will help the strabismus (eye alignment problems) caused by the traumatic brain injury,

Would stereograms help?  Seems it would force you to exercise the part of the brain that helps align the images, but it's a bit off so maybe would make it worse.

Here's a neat one I just ran into, and pretty easy.



GATOxVoS
Heroic Explorer
@CircaRigel - Ah, please forgive me then, I apologize for the misunderstanding, and my ignorance as to the research.

I do still stand behind my ideas for getting the companies to gift you a headset though 🙂
PC Specs:
Intel i7-6700k @ 4.5 Ghz
Gigabyte Z170X-Gaming 3 Motherboard
RTX 2080 Ti - MSI VENTUS
16 GB CAS-10 RAM @ 2400 MHz
Startech 4-port/4-USB controller add-on card
850W Corsair HX850 PSU
4-Sensor, Roomscale Setup

CircaRigel
Explorer

No.  I don't think so.  The eye doctors already had me try exercises like that, and they were unsuccessful.  However, I've started looking up clinical studies utilizing VR for the various issues I have, and will be applying to some that seem promising.  There's even one for acquired adult strabismus, and while their subject age range is 15-40, and I'm just outside that at 42, I'm hoping they might accept me into it.  There are others as well for TBI, PTSD, Chronic Pain, and other issues I've been left with following the accident and subsequent spine surgeries.

That's a neat picture, though.  Thank you for sharing!  I really like it!

TwoHedWlf said:

My thoughts on VR are that it will help the strabismus (eye alignment problems) caused by the traumatic brain injury,

Would stereograms help?  Seems it would force you to exercise the part of the brain that helps align the images, but it's a bit off so maybe would make it worse.

Here's a neat one I just ran into, and pretty easy.






OriginalTheory
Honored Guest
CircaRigel, I too have had a hard time getting through to Oculus, in regards to improving medical research thru the unit.  

My stepfather had a stroke, and I've been trying to get other feedback from others with medical conditions to help out, and potentially get a few things answered .

If you'd like to stay in touch, maybe us as a team could get something moving within these forums and on social media?

Here is the link to where I posted my stepfathers situation.

https://forums.oculus.com/developer/discussion/51607/vr-oculus-stroke-therapy-vr-rehabilitation#late...

brian.hurren.75
Explorer

I had a similar accident 4.5 years ago. I was a pedestrian and got run over by a car. I ended up with severe TBI even though our simptoms are prob different. I think verual physio might help, anyway it will provide exercise. I had hemiplegia on my right side using a recumbent Exercycle helped a lot to get movement back. so a virtual Exercycle might help. I made my own vr head set about 3 years ago so I could try a virtual dark and quite room so I could rest for an hour or so without any interference. that seemed to work . I was going to try building another vr set, but it isnt worth it so I am buying one instead. it works of if you need to rest you mind esp frontal cortex.