Virtual Reality Exposure Therapy for Gambling Disorder — VIRET-GAD  

Gambling Disorder Clinical Trial

Official title: Virtual Reality Exposure Therapy for Gambling Disorder: Randomized Controlled Trial

Status Not yet recruiting

Clinical Trial Summary

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.

Clinical Trial Description

Main aim:

Show, within patients seeking care for GD, that VRET integrated with CBT is non-inferior to imaginal ET integrated with CBT on GD symptom reduction at the end of 12 treatment sessions.

Secondary objectives:

1. Show that VRET integrated with CBT is non-inferior to imaginal ET integrated with CBT on GD symptom reduction during the first 12 months post-treatment.

2. Compare the effect of the two therapeutic strategies on GD symptoms (measured by complementary assessments to that used in the main aim), at the end of treatment and during the first 12 months post-treatment.

3. Show the efficacy of VRET integrated with CBT compared to imaginal ET integrated with CBT on gambling behavior, craving, and gambling-related cognitions at the end of treatment and during the first 12 months post-treatment.

4. Show the efficacy of VRET integrated with CBT compared to imaginal ET integrated with CBT on the evolution of anxiety and depressive symptoms at the end of treatment and during the first 12 months post-treatment.

5. Compare the quality of the two therapeutic strategies at the end of treatment. ;

Related Conditions & MeSH terms

• Gambling
• Gambling Disorder

• NCT number: NCT04467502
• Study type: Interventional
• Source: University Hospital, Lille
• Contact: Pierre TAQUET, PhD
• Phone: 0320445838
• Email: pierre.taquet@chru-lille.fr
• Status: Not yet recruiting
• Phase: N/A
• Start date: January 2024
• Completion date: July 2026