Neurofeedback-EEG-VR System for Non-opioid Pain Therapy

This study will assess the feasibility of developing the Neurofeedback-EEG-VR (NEVR) system for non-opioid pain therapy. Subjects suffering from pain will undergo sessions involving VR and Neurofeedback training and their pain will be assessed.

QUASAR and UCSD are conducting a clinical trial on 25 subjects to evaluate the feasibility of a novel Neurofeedback electroencephalography (EEG) Virtual Reality (VR) system aimed at reducing chronic pain. The NEVR device consists of a dry electrode EEG headset combined with a VR Head-Mounted Display (VR-HMD) device and neurofeedback software. This approach relies on retraining the brain's networks to reduce the perception of pain and does not involve pharmaceutical drugs. Patients with chronic lower back pain will be recruited by UCSD at its Altman Clinical \& Translational Research Institute. Patients that meet the recruitment criteria will be asked to conduct 20 1-hour long sessions of EEG-based Neurofeedback in VR over the course of a couple of months. Pain assessment and device usability questionnaires will be conducted prior to and after the first and last sessions, and at intermediate time points. This will be a single arm clinical trial aimed at demonstrating the safety and viability of the NEVR device, with the primary outcome measure being the ability of patients to conduct all 20 sessions safely and comfortably. Secondary outcome measures include assessment of changes in pain perception, and of changes in EEG activity patterns.