KR100452093B1 - Virtual reality apparatus for curing mental disorder - Google Patents

Abstract

A virtual environment apparatus for treating a mentally ill patient is disclosed. A virtual environment apparatus for treating a mental disorder patient according to the present invention is a virtual environment apparatus for treating a mental disorder patient for an individual and a group, comprising: HMD means including visual field movement sensing means and both hands of a patient. Wearable data glover means for sensing and transmitting location information, aroma means for converting a digital signal of a computer means for directional components into a chemical signal, input means for accepting at least the position and operation of a patient, and Location means for receiving location information from the HMD means and transmitting it to the control device, bio signal sensing input means attached to the body of the patient to detect biosignal information detected from the body, and all environments implemented in the virtual environment And computer means for storing an object library to be demonstrated in a virtual environment.

According to the present invention, in a virtual environment, a patient who complains of a psychiatric symptom is reproduced in a virtual environment by directly reproducing a real situation associated with the symptom through a virtual environment. It leads to improvement of symptoms through repeated interactions of, which leads to adaptation in daily life, thus providing an innovative treatment device that can effectively treat the painful symptoms in real life only with virtual experiences, not real experiences.

Description

VIRTUAL REALITY APPARATUS FOR CURING MENTAL DISORDER}

The present invention relates to a virtual environmental apparatus for treating a mental disorder patient, and more particularly, to a virtual environmental apparatus for treating a mental disorder patient to improve symptoms through repeated interaction with the virtual environment.

As science and industry develop, the number of people with mental illness increases. In addition, mental illnesses such as anxiety, phobias, compulsions, and depression are also diversifying. However, there has been little development of breakthrough technology since Freud's psychotherapy method was announced. In other words, the method of behavioral therapy, which is a kind of psychotherapy, is a systematic desensitization method. This is to reduce the fear of the fear-inducing situation by using the muscle relaxation method together with the imagination of the fear-inducing situation.

However, in using systematic desensitization methods, several studies report that a large number of patients have difficulty imagining predetermined scenes of anxiety. Moreover, they are known to have a strong aversion to experiencing real situations. In recent years, computer-based treatments and psychiatric disease treatments using virtual reality techniques have been developed.

Since the early 1990s, several preliminary studies using virtual reality technology have been successfully conducted to treat fear, fear of heights, and fear of other situations. These research activities have attracted the attention of serious scientists in the fields of computer science, psychology, and psychiatry, and current research has expanded on previous achievements to take advantage of computerized therapies and a vast range of virtual reality for more patients. I am looking for systematic research.

Computer software for computerized treatment was developed by Judy Proudfoot, Ph.D., of the Institute of Psychiatry in London, UK, which will begin clinical trials for patients with depression at the Priory Hospital in northern London. Known. The software transforms the cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) that psychiatrists use to treat depression into computer programs that can be easily used by patients.

Another treatment method is a treatment method using a virtual environment. The treatment method using the virtual reality adopts a method of interacting with a computer through visual, auditory, and tactile senses by immersing a user in a world made by a computer. Virtual environments differ from traditional displays in that computer graphics, various displays, and input technologies are integrated to provide presence or immersion to the user.

The virtual environment provides a paradigm where new humans and computers interact, where the user is no longer simply an external observer of information or images on the computer screen, but is actively involved in the three-dimensional virtual world produced by the computer. Participate The virtual environment is called virtual reality, remote reality, artificial world, cyber space or multisensory input space.

1 is a conceptual diagram of a general virtual reality system, which is largely divided into an input / output device and a computer system.

The input / output device is composed of a sensor device 91 that makes sense of sight, hearing, touch, smell, and the like, and an input device 92 for inputting a position, a direction, a voice, and the like. The sensory output device 91 may vary depending on the user's sensory organs such as visual, auditory, tactile and olfactory. Specifically, the visual information output apparatus includes a head mounted display (HMD), a monitor, a (three-dimensional) projector, an electronic shuttering eyewear, a dome display device, a CAVE, and the like. The output device includes a speaker, an earphone, and the like, and the tactile information output device includes a vibrator, a pressure pad, and a motion base device.

The input device 92 performs a function of accepting a user's position, motion, etc., a 3D position tracker that accepts the user's position, and an eye tracker that tracks the user's eye position. tracker), BOOM (binocular omni-orientatonal monitors) that show images according to the position of the user's head, and sensors attached to a glove to detect head and hand position, and input plane or stereo coordinate data. Mouse, joystick, space ball, etc.

In addition, the hardware 93 of the computer system includes a graphics accelerator 93a, a sound processor 93b, an input / output port 93c, and the software 94 includes a simulation engine 94a and a virtual world editing controller. 94b, virtual world databases DB, 94c, etc. are provided.

The graphic accelerator processes a stereo image of 15 frames or more per second with a short delay time to provide a realistic image, and dynamically provides an image to the situation whenever the user's viewpoint changes.

When the virtual world is defined by the virtual world editing controller, the simulation engine 94a reads the modeling result from the virtual world database to provide an initial virtual world, and monitors what the user does in the virtual world. According to the virtual world scenario, the virtual world is operated to make the virtual world respond to the action.

The virtual world editing controller 94b gives a geometrical model of all the objects constituting the virtual world, and gives the physical properties of each object so that the object can have a behavior similar to that of the real world. It supports the mechanics applied between the world and the objects that make up it, and how to interact with objects and their use.

For example, in the related art, a position sensor and a direction sensor are attached to a human body, that is, an arm or a head, and the arm, the head position and the direction of movement are identified, and then reconstructed into a realistic 3D image sound, and the 3D image. The sound is delivered to human eyes or ears using helmets, HMDs, etc., so that humans can feel as if they are actually moving in virtual reality.

However, the conventional method for treating mental disorders using the virtual reality system sets up a uniform virtual environment according to a disease and uniformly presents the same virtual environment for the same disease, so that even if the same disease is associated with a particular situation, the environment related to the symptoms is individually different. There is a problem that the treatment is difficult to achieve. For example, it is difficult to apply the same virtual environment to a patient suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, a patient suffering from a traffic accident, and a patient suffering from a war aftereffect.

The technical problem to be achieved in the present invention may vary in the actual environment associated with the symptoms of mental illness, each of them to avoid the existing uniform virtual environment to treat such individual special situation by customizing the virtual environment for each individual situation By demonstrating differentiation, it is possible to maximize the treatment effect by symptom, to detect the change of the patient's living body due to the demonstration of the virtual environment, and to execute it repeatedly (biofeedback effect) until the symptom is improved. It is.

1 is a conceptual configuration diagram of a general virtual environment system.

Figure 2 is a block diagram showing the structure of a virtual environment device for treating a patient with mental illness according to an embodiment of the present invention.

A virtual environment apparatus for treating a mental disorder patient according to the present invention for achieving the above technical problem is a virtual environment apparatus for treating a mental disorder patient for individuals and groups, the visual field movement detection for maximizing the virtual immersion effect HMD means comprising means; Data glover means worn on both hands of the patient to detect and transmit location information; Aroma means for converting the digital signal of the computer means for the aromatic component into a chemical signal; Input means for accepting at least the position and movement of the patient and the like; Location detecting means for receiving location information from the HMD means and transmitting the location information to a control device; Biosignal sensing input means attached to a body of a patient to sense biosignal information detected from the body; And computer means for controlling all environments implemented in the virtual environment and storing object libraries to be demonstrated in the virtual environment.

In addition, the input means preferably comprises at least one of a space ball, a space mouse, or a joystick means for detecting and transmitting a three-dimensional position through both hands of the patient.

In addition, the biosignal sensing input means preferably includes at least one of means for measuring electrocardiogram, blood pressure, pulse rate, and brain wave from at least a patient.

In addition, the computer means preferably comprises an output and display medium capable of receiving and displaying the bio-signal information by wire or wireless.

In addition, the computer means preferably comprises a database for storing the virtual environment library.

In addition, the position detecting means, it is preferable to determine the position through the field of view detecting means provided on the upper end of the HMD means worn on the patient's head and transmit the position information to the computer means.

Hereinafter, preferred embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the accompanying drawings.

2 is a virtual environment device according to an embodiment of the present invention. The computer means (S) is composed of a software unit consisting of a simulation engine, a virtual world editor, and a virtual environment storage device (DB) 2 having a general structure, a graphic accelerator, a sound processor, and an input / output port. A printing monitor such as a printer 3 and a monitoring monitor 1 for displaying and controlling the computer means S for controlling and controlling all environments implemented in virtual reality, and observing the patient's condition; It is connected to the storage device 2 that stores the virtual environment library. The storage device 2 is stored by editing the object library to be demonstrated in the virtual space.

The drive driver interface 4 is interconnected with the computer means S and the patient, and provides a virtual environment via circuit lines. The positioning means 5 detects the position of the HMD means 14 worn on the head of the patient through the field of view detecting means 16 and receives the position information by wire or wireless to the computer means S. To transmit to. The HMD means 14 is provided with a display device, a view movement detecting means 16, and an acoustic means 13, which produce the effect of viewing an extra-large screen. The data glover means 10 is inserted into the hand of the mentally ill and transmits information according to the position and direction of the hand to the computer means S. The space ball, space mouse or joystick means 9 reads the values of X, Y and Z to detect the hand position in three dimensions and transmits the information to be used as a tool for positioning.

The AROMA means 6 is a device capable of converting the digital signal of the computer means for the aromatic component into a chemical signal. It uses a patient's sense of smell to contain certain types of fragrances to relieve tension and maximize immersion. The biosignal sensing input means 7 and 8 measure the electrocardiogram, blood pressure, pulse and brain wave detected from the patient's living body, and transmit the measurement information to the computer means S. The biosignal information serves as a basis for determining symptom improvement of the mentally ill and is simultaneously displayed on the monitor of the HMD worn by the patient and the computer means S.

The inventive concepts and embodiments disclosed in the present invention may be used by those skilled in the art as a basis for modifying or designing other structures for carrying out the same purposes of the present invention. In addition, such modifications or altered equivalent structures by those skilled in the art may be variously changed, substituted and changed without departing from the spirit or scope of the invention described in the claims.

As described above, according to the present invention, the patient who complains of the psychiatric symptoms can be reproduced in the virtual environment with the same symptoms as those felt in the actual situation by reproducing the actual situation associated with the symptoms through the virtual environment. Innovative treatment that induces improvement of symptoms through repetitive interaction with virtual environment, which leads to adaptation in daily life, and thus enables effective treatment of painful symptoms in real life with virtual experience instead of real experience. Provide the device.

Claims (12)

What is claimed is: 1. A virtual environment apparatus for treating mental disorders for individuals and groups. HMD means including visual field movement sensing means for maximizing the virtual immersion effect; Data glover means worn on both hands of the patient to detect and transmit location information; Aroma means for converting the digital signal of the computer means for the aromatic component into a chemical signal; Input means for accepting at least the position and movement of the patient and the like; Location detecting means for receiving location information from the HMD means and transmitting the location information to a control device; Biosignal sensing input means attached to a body of a patient to sense biosignal information detected from the body; And A virtual environment apparatus for treating a mentally ill patient, comprising computer means for controlling all environments implemented in the virtual environment and storing object libraries to be demonstrated in the virtual environment. The method of claim 1, wherein the input means, And at least one of a space ball, a space mouse, or a joystick means for detecting and transmitting a three-dimensional position through both hands of the patient. 2. The virtual environment apparatus of claim 1, wherein the biosignal sensing input means comprises at least one of means for measuring electrocardiogram, blood pressure, pulse rate, and brain wave from at least a patient. The method of claim 1, wherein the computer means, And a virtual environment device for treating a mentally ill patient including an output and a display medium capable of receiving and displaying biosignal information through wired and wireless communication. The computer means according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein Virtual environment device for treating a mentally ill patient comprising a database storing a virtual environment library. The method of claim 1, wherein the positioning means, The virtual environment device for treating a mental disorder patient to determine the position through the field of view movement detection means provided on the upper end of the HMD means worn on the head of the patient and to transmit the position information to the computer means. delete delete delete delete delete delete