Adaptation of a VR therapeutic game for spatial attention to a fMRI environment

F. Binkofski, A. Schüppen
University Hospital Aachen, RWTH, Aachen, Germany

The aim of our study is the implementation of the virtual reality (VR) therapeutic stimuli from VR-Traveller to a functional magnetic resonance (fMRI) environment with the goal to monitor the effects of therapy in the brains of young patients with cognitive deficits. VR-Traveller is a comprehensive VR therapy program focused on treatment of visual attention and of working memory. Results from a pilot study demonstrate that the VR-Traveller therapy is very well accepted by the young patients and have positive therapeutic effects.

In the first step we managed to adapt the VR-Traveller stimuli to our MRI Siemens Prisma environment using the 3D MRI presentation goggles by Nordic Lab (Norway).

In a pilot fMRI measurement on a normal subject we found that the VR-Traveller stimuli activate the brain areas engaged in visual search and visual attention. Based on this positive preliminary results we now perform a study on a population of normal subjects with the goal to create a normative data set. Based on this results we will be able to find out changes in the brain activation due to the presentation of the VR-Traveller stimuli. And this will be the basis for the tracing of the results of the VR-Traveller therapy and their effects on the plasticity in the central nervous system.