On March 8th 2025, the first trial of Conquer Catharsis, the prototype on which Calm Quest is based, was published in the Springer Nature Virtual Reality journal.
The trial, performed independently by the Medical University of Vienna at the Vienna General Hospital and the Clinic in Grieskirchen, shows a significant reduction in stress and anxiety among children and adolescents who use Conquer Catharsis.
The reduction is equal to the efficacy of conventional biofeedback methods and technology, which is being used in clinical settings today.
While an improved result would have been more favorable to us, the fact that it is as good as the current standard in the market, is also a big milestone for Acute XR.
Since the trial, we have built Calm Quest on the basis of learnings from the trial, incorporating new design choices to improve usability and practicability of the solution for therapists in real work settings.
One thing the study did not reflect on, was the increased interest in our prototype from the patients. The researchers told us that the kids were immediately immersed when they entered our virtual world and that they had a lot of fun exploring it and kept asking when they could play again. We also had a few participants give up mid-trial in the control group, while the main study group with our prototype did not lose a single patient. In fact, after the trial was over, they all wanted to know if they could come back to play some more. This fact alone is almost more important to us than the trial itself, because we want kids to have fun during therapy and we want them to keep coming back willingly and not feel forced into the process. This anecdotal result shows us that we are on the right track to turning therapy into play.