VFX Voice - Fall 2017

PROFILE
DR. SKIP RIZZO
AND THE RISE OF
MEDICAL VR THERAPY
By NAOMI GOLDMAN
TOP: Albert “Skip” Rizzo, Ph.D., Director, Medical Virtual
Reality, USC Institute for Creative Technologies.
BOTTOM: Virtual Iraq/Afghanistan delivers virtual
reality exposure therapy for treating PTSD.
All images courtesy of Dr. “Skip” Rizzo and the USC
Institute for Creative Technologies.
Once thought to be a technology exclusively for entertainment,
virtual reality applications pioneered by Albert “Skip” Rizzo,
Ph.D. have provided life-changing therapeutic results for clients
with serious anxiety disorders and members of the military in
particular.
As the Director of Medical Virtual Reality at USC’s Institute for
Creative Technologies (ICT) and Research Professor at the USC’s
Department of Psychiatry and School of Gerontology, Dr. Rizzo has
been at the forefront of dramatic innovations in clinical research
and care for more than two decades, and his application of VR as
a valuable tool in medical treatment underscores the broadening
growth of VR beyond entertainment.
A leader in artificial intelligence, graphics, virtual reality and
narrative, ICT advances low-cost immersive techniques and technologies
to creatively address vital medical issues facing society.
Under Dr. Rizzo’s direction, ICT has pushed the boundaries in
treating people affected with debilitating anxiety disorders. Those
treatments include landmark efforts to help military personnel
with Bravemind, a virtual reality exposure therapy for treating
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder; Stress Resilience In Virtual
Environments (STRIVE), which aims to better prepare military
personnel for emotional challenges inherent in the combat environment,
before they deploy; and SimCoach, a Web-based virtual
human to assist people in care to overcome barriers.
ICT has also developed interactive “Game-Based Rehab” to
augment physical rehabilitation for patients recovering from
stroke or traumatic brain injury, as well as for the elderly and those
with a disability.
VFX Voice talked with Dr. Rizzo about the rise of VR as a
powerful therapeutic tool, the bumps in the road, and the promise
that lies ahead.
Q: What was the thought process that led you to pursue VR
for use in clinical psychology and rehab?
A: The lightbulb ultimately went off thanks to a young man and
his Game Boy. In the early 1990s, the state of cognitive rehab was
really limited by the absence of technology. I would tell my clients
that if you want to recover your brain function, your attention,
memory and executive function, you would have to put in the same
amount of effort into rehab exercises as if you wanted to learn to
play the violin. It became more and more obvious to me that to do
rehab at a level where you can really measure improvement, you
have to do it for intense periods of time beyond what is pragmatically
feasible with the cost of having humans facilitate that work.
But armed with technology, where the user can practice on their
own, you’re looking at a much greater possibility. I was struck by
kids who played video games for hours on end and imagined, what
if you could get a client engaged in well-produced sophisticated
content to do their rehab for that period of time? Then one fateful
day in 1991, I watched a less than compliant rehab client transfixed
for hours by his Nintendo Game Boy and that was the ‘aha’
moment that kicked things into gear.
It started with the idea of using game-based stuff to make it fun
48 • VFXVOICE.COM FALL 2017