{"id":8319,"date":"2024-03-18T14:30:00","date_gmt":"2024-03-18T14:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/itsveterans.com\/?p=8319"},"modified":"2024-03-18T14:30:00","modified_gmt":"2024-03-18T14:30:00","slug":"virtual-reality-is-veterans-path-to-recovery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/itsveterans.com\/?p=8319","title":{"rendered":"Virtual reality is Veteran\u2019s path to recovery"},"content":{"rendered":"

Originally published:<\/strong> 2024-03-18T14:30:00+00:00. Historical source article: benefits, rules, amounts and deadlines may have changed. Check the official source for current information.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was my first time using virtual reality. There was a dichotomy in my brain between \u2018I am perfectly fine and I am freaking out\u2019 and \u2018I am perfectly fine\u2019 was winning.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s Army Veteran Joshua Maloney talking about his recovery treatment.<\/p>\n

His virtual reality experience included gunpowder, radio chatter, turret machine gun and explosive vibrations, ending with a 360-degree virtual reality (VR) view from a Humvee driver seat traveling through a war zone.<\/p>\n

Maloney enlisted in 2009, starting his Army tanker career with a one-year deployment to Mosul, Iraq. He finished his contract and returned home. Nine years later, he went from 18 beers a day to 30 to cope with undiagnosed PTSD.<\/p>\n

Knowing he had to do something, he got a job in Veteran outreach. It was there he finally found help when he started a detox program.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I got to detox, I had the shakes and there was this VA nurse I will never forget,\u201d Maloney said. He tried to tell her he didn\u2019t have PTSD. She reassured him he did.<\/p>\n

It was the first time someone had validated his suspicions. He took every program offered to him, including a VA research study led by Dr. Noah Philip. The study combined exposure to virtual reality scenes from Iraq or Afghanistan with low-level electrical current known as transcranial direct current stimulation.<\/p>\n

Virtual reality exposure research<\/h2>\n

Through this study, he learned his fears weren\u2019t too scary to face. By allowing his experiences and thoughts to be uncompartmentalized, he was able to address his trauma and start a path to recovery.<\/p>\n

He highly recommends seeking help and innovative ways to augment therapy, like VR exposure, to his fellow Veterans. \u201cTry it. You might notice you don\u2019t feel that much during it and that is okay. Advocate for yourself and your own therapy. You can always stop,\u201d Phillip said. \u201cIn combat, there was something wrong with turning around and saying no. It was something that was not allowed. With therapy and our lives, that is not a thing. Not only do we get to take care of ourselves, we have to.\u201d<\/p>\n

PTSD is a mental health problem that some people develop after experiencing or witnessing a life-threatening traumatic event.\u00a0The good news is there are effective treatments. VA is committed to ensuring Veterans have access to the treatments that work best.<\/p>\n

You can learn about evidence-based treatments for PTSD<\/a>.\u00a0 VA is researching innovative technology to augment therapy, and is leading the nation in the clinical implementation of immersive technology such as VR. So far, VA has deployed over 3,000 VR headsets across more than 170 VA facilities.<\/p>\n

To learn more about VA\u2019s work to advance this transformative approach to care, visit VA Immersive\u2019s website<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n

Source: U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs<\/a>. Its Veterans is an independent publication and is not affiliated with or endorsed by the U.S. government.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Army Veteran Joshua Maloney uses virtual reality exposure to aid in PTSD and alcohol addiction recovery<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":67,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8319","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-u-s-veterans-news"],"yoast_head":"\nVirtual reality is Veteran\u2019s path to recovery - Its Veterans<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Army Veteran Joshua Maloney uses virtual reality exposure to aid in PTSD and alcohol addiction recovery\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/itsveterans.com\/?p=8319\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Virtual reality is Veteran\u2019s path to recovery - 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