Virtual Reality Exposure Therapy for Gambling Disorder

Recruiting now · Not applicable

Conditions studied: Gambling Disorder

In brief

Gambling disorder (GD) is recognized as an addictive disorder in the DSM-5. Craving is a core phenomenon in addiction that can lead to relapse in problem gambling for pathological gamblers. Exposure Therapy (ET) focuses on craving in addiction treatment. ET in Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT) is based on classical conditioning that addresses the association between contextual cues and the craving response. ET helps the patient to reduce craving when faced with cues triggering craving. ET includes in vivo exposure and imaginal exposure. The literature recommends being as close as possible to the context of addiction to facilitate the extinction of craving but in vivo ET is complicated to perform. For GD, in outpatient consultation, bringing a patient to a casino presents obstacles (e.g., time, human and financial cost, agreement with casino for therapy). The study will be to assess the effectiveness of Virtual Reality Exposure Therapy (VRET) in a virtual gambling environment. Various trials show that VRET is no more or less effective than classical ET in CBT but has other advantages for motivation to treatment. This research aims to compare efficacy between CBT with VRET and CBT with imaginal exposure for treatment of GD in a multicenter, randomized, controlled, non-inferiority clinical trial.

Key facts

Study ID

NCT04467502

Run by

University Hospital, Lille

People needed

124

Starts

2023-07-12

Expected to finish

2027-07-01

Last updated by the study team

2026-05-14

Who can join

Age: 18 and older. Sex: any. Healthy volunteers: not accepted.

You may qualify if…

• Seek treatment for GD within one of health care facilities participating in the research (first request for treatment and not patients already receiving treatment for gambling disorder in the care center).
• Meet a current diagnosis of gambling disorder according to DSM-5 criteria and with a South Oaks Gambling Screen (SOGS) score ≥ 5
• Meet a casino gambling behavior with a casino gambling frequency ≥ 1 time every two months during the last 12 months
• Have a sufficient understanding of French for therapy
• Beneficiary of the French social security system
• Give an informed consent to participate
• Willing to comply with all study procedures and duration

You may not qualify if…

• Visual disturbance making impossible the use of virtual reality equipment (e.g. advanced retinal degeneration, central scotoma, age-related macular degeneration)
• Pregnant woman
• Minor or adult under guardianship, conservatorship, under judicial protection, persons deprived of their liberty
• Balance disorder (e.g. cerebellar disorder, inner ear disorder)
• Photosensitive epilepsy
• Refusal to participate

Where it is running

• CH Seclin Carvin CSAPA — Seclin, France (enrolling)
• CH Boulogne sur mer CSAPA — Boulogne-sur-Mer, France
• CHU de Caen — Caen, France
• Hôpital Fontan, CHU lille — Lille, France
• Assoriation Cédragir Lomme CSAPA — Lomme, France
• CH de l'arrondissement de Montreuil / CSAPA — Montreuil-sur-Mer, France
• CHU Rouen — Rouen, France
• CH de Saint Amand les Eaux — Saint-Amand-les-Eaux, France
• CHU Amiens-Picardie — Amiens, France
• Association GREID ValenciennesCSAPA — Valenciennes, France

Full record on ClinicalTrials.gov

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