The future of Cybertherapy: Improved options with advanced technologies

Cybertherapy is a field that is growing rapidly due to today's technology and information boom. Virtual reality and advanced technologies have been used successfully to in a variety of healthcare issues, including treatment of anxiety disorders and phobias, treatment of eating and body dysmorphic disorders, neuropsychological assessment and rehabilitation and distraction during painful or unpleasant medical procedures. The novel applications of these technologies yield many advantages over traditional treatment modalities, and the disadvantages that accompanied the first trials of virtual reality are quickly being addressed and eliminated. Virtual reality peripherals such as data gloves, physiological monitoring and Internet worlds are swiftly demonstrating their usefulness in cybertherapy applications. Future directions for research include improvements of objective measures of efficacy such as fMRI and physiological monitoring devices, and investigations are being carried out to determine if virtual reality and advanced technologies can be used to treat a broader scope of disorders, including depression, schizophrenia, drug addiction, and autism.