COVID Feel Good – An Easy Self-Help Virtual Reality Protocol to Overcome the Psychological Burden of Coronavirus

Abstract

Background: Living in the time of the COVID-19 means experiencing not only a global health emergency but also extreme psychological stress with potential emotional side effects such as sadness, grief, irritability and mood swings. Crucially, lockdown and confinement measures isolate people who become the first and the only ones in charge of their own mental health: people are left alone facing a novel and potentially lethal situation, and, at the same time, they need to develop adaptive strategies to face it, at home. In this view, easy-to-use, inexpensive, and scientifically validated self-help solutions aiming to reduce the psychological burden of coronavirus are extremely necessary.Aims: This pragmatic trial aims to provide the evidence that a weekly self-help virtual reality (VR) protocol can help overcome the psychological burden of the Coronavirus by relieving anxiety, improving well-being and reinforcing social connectedness. The protocol will be based on the “Secret Garden” 360 VR video online (www.covidfeelgood.com) which simulates a natural environment aiming to promote relaxation and self-reflexion. 360° or spherical videos allow the user to control the viewing direction. In this way, the user can explore the content from any angle like a panorama and experience presence and immersion. The “Secret Garden” video is combined with daily exercises that are designed to be experienced with another person (not necessarily physically together), to facilitate a process of critical examination and eventual revision of core assumptions and beliefs related to personal identity, relationships and goals.Methods: This is a multicentric, pragmatic pilot randomized controlled trial involving individuals who experienced the COVID-19 pandemic and underwent a lockdown and quarantine procedures. The trial is approved by the Ethics Committee of the Istituto Auxologico Italiano. Each research group in all the countries joining the pragmatic trial, aims at enrolling at least 30 individuals in the experimental group experiencing the self-help protocol, and 30 in the control group, over a period of 3 months to verify the feasibility of the intervention.Conclusion: The goal of this protocol is for VR to become the “surgical mask” of mental health treatment. Although surgical masks do not provide the wearer with a reliable level of protection against the coronavirus compared with FFP2 or FFP3 masks, surgical masks are very effective in protecting others from the wearer’s respiratory emissions. The goal of the VR protocol is the same: not necessarily to solve complex mental health problems but rather to improve well-being and preserve social connectedness.

The possibility and importance of immersive technologies during COVID-19 for autistic people

“…Moreover, the improvements achieved by the self-led arm were maintained at the six-month follow-up, and patients undergoing the therapist-led arm also continued to improve at the 12-month follow-up. These results support the use of mobile-based VRET solutions such as the COVID Feel Good weekly self-help protocol for overcoming the psychological burden of the coronavirus (Riva et al, 2020). Using this protocol, the user engages every day for one week with a 10-min guided VR mindfulness activity (Plate 4) that is further enhanced through a range of different daily social tasks aiming at facilitating a process of critical examination and eventually revision of core assumptions and beliefs.…”

Virtual Therapeutic Garden: A Promising Method Supporting the Treatment of Depressive Symptoms in Late-Life: A Randomized Pilot Study

“…Recently, the study protocol of “Secret Garden” has appeared, which adapts the ideas of a therapeutic garden to VR goggles in order to improve the mood during the COVID-19 pandemic [ 50 ]. Unfortunately, we will have to wait for the results of this study, although a preprint of an adult study has recently appeared [ 51 ].…”

Positive Technology and COVID-19

“…A practical example of this approach is provided by the free COVID Feel Good (www.covidfeelgood.com) weekly self-help virtual reality protocol. 42,43 The protocol consists on watching, for a week, at least once a day, a 10-minute VR video, named ''The Secret Garden,'' currently available in eight different languages: English, Spanish, French, Brasilian Portuguese, Italian, Catalan, Korean, and Japanese.…”