Technology plays an increasingly important role in our everyday lives. Smartphone applications have not yet been around for too long, but already strongly shape our daily routines. Technological innovations that more recently have been starting to find their way to the broader public are virtual and augmented reality (VR and AR respectively). What was only known to a few people over a decade ago, is now quickly becoming a mainstream tool, both for work and pleasure.

Fernando Tarnogol has been fascinated by VR since the early days and has in recent years also explored its potential for mental healthcare. With Phobos VR, he developed one of the first publicly available (free) online platforms for the treatment of specific phobia and the first markerless smartphone application for the treatment of animal phobia. During this talk, he will tell you about his initial ideas, the potential he saw in both VR and AR, and the struggles he encountered with upscaling and implementing.  He will also discuss some research findings and what he believes to be important opportunities for the near future.

This free event was specifically targeted towards healthcare professionals with an interest in these e-mental health technologies and researchers who wished to learn more about the potential of these tools for applied, practice-oriented clinical research. It was hosted by the expertise Unit Psychology, Technology & Society of Thomas More University of Applied Sciences.

The slides are now available for download.

This lecture was part of the TETRA Immersive Care project, which aims to better exploit the potential of immersive technology within healthcare. This project is financed by the Flemish Agency for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, with co-financing from Flemish organisations.