Efficacy of virtual reality exposure therapy for the treatment of dental phobia in adults: A randomized controlled trial

•VRET seems to be an effective treatment for dental phobia.•Six months after VRET, 85% of patients had lost their dental phobia diagnosis.•Majority of the patients scheduled dental appointments within 6-months post-VRET.•Advantage of VRET is that it can be carried out by trained auxiliary personnel....

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of anxiety disorders 2019-03, Vol.62, p.100-108
Main Authors: Gujjar, Kumar Raghav, van Wijk, Arjen, Kumar, Ratika, de Jongh, Ad
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adult
Dental anxiety
Dental Anxiety - therapy
Dental phobia
Female
Heart Rate
Humans
Male
Phobic Disorders - therapy
Research Design
Single-Blind Method
State anxiety
Treatment Outcome
Virtual reality exposure therapy
Virtual Reality Exposure Therapy - methods
Young Adult
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Summary:•VRET seems to be an effective treatment for dental phobia.•Six months after VRET, 85% of patients had lost their dental phobia diagnosis.•Majority of the patients scheduled dental appointments within 6-months post-VRET.•Advantage of VRET is that it can be carried out by trained auxiliary personnel. Although Virtual Reality Exposure Therapy (VRET) has proven to be effective in the treatment of various subtypes of specific phobia, there is limited evidence of its role in the treatment of dental phobia. A single-blind RCT was conducted among 30 randomized patients with dental phobia to either VRET or informational pamphlet (IP) condition. Primary outcome anxiety measures (VAS-A, MDAS and DFS) were evaluated at baseline, pre- and post-intervention, 1-week, 3-months and 6-months follow-up. Secondary outcome measures assessed were pre-post behavioral avoidance, temporal variations of heart rate and VR-experience during and post-VRET, and dental treatment acceptance in both conditions at 6-month follow-up. Intention to treat analysis, using a repeated measures MANOVA, revealed a multivariate interaction effect between time and condition (p = 0.015) for all primary outcome measures (all ps 
ISSN:0887-6185
1873-7897
DOI:10.1016/j.janxdis.2018.12.001