Building BRAVEMIND Vietnam: User-Centered Design for Virtual Reality Exposure Therapy

There has been a recent resurgence of Vietnam-era Veterans seeking Veteran Affairs (VA) services for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Multiple studies have reported positive outcomes using Virtual Reality Exposure Therapy (VRET) with Iraq/Afghanistan Veteran PTSD patients, but there have been fewer investigations into the acceptability and feasibility of VRET with older Veterans. We have extended an established VRET system, BRAVEMIND, to include Vietnam relevant content following a user-centered iterative design methodology. This paper will present the BRAVEMIND Vietnam VRET system, including setup, content, and technical architecture along with the findings of an initial focus group with Vietnam Veterans. These Veterans rated this system to be acceptable as a treatment tool for combat-related PTSD and provided valuable first-person accounts of their time in Vietnam to help guide the evolution of the VR content.