Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy

[FlowerPower62]

Morning all, has anyone heard of this? Frustrated with the lack of progress my husband is making, I started googling, and found this. It's not available in the NHS, but it does sound good. But if it is, why aren't we told about it? Anything is worth a try, surely, as long as it's safe?

[Kirk5w7]

Hi FlowerPower

I always fancied this but I could never summon the effort needed to push for it.

I read that it was particularly useful in the early days of recovery from stroke and thought that I’d probably missed the best time it would be useful for myself.

Our MS society( in Manchester) has a chamber which can be used for a fee if you get referred by your GP or consultant. I just never got round to it.

I seem to recollect it’s quite a lengthy process, I may not be remembering right, so would have needed a lot of assistance from my husband and he would have to take more time off work on a regular basis for me to attend regularly enough to get the best from it.

If you pursue this please come back with how the process goes and any benefits.

Janet

[FlowerPower62 in reply to Kirk5w7]

Thanks for that, I didn't know there was one bin Manchester, thought we'd have to go to London. I don't know if he could have it either, as he has a shunt fitted, not sure if that would work.

[sospan]

From what I have read over the years HBOT is most effective for HI survivors early on in the injury e.g.firsts 6 months. The results after that seem inconclusive.

However, since my own HI, I have had surgery 4 times not related to my HI. One general and 3 local operations but each requiring me to have oxygen. After each surgery I have felt a lot better in terms of all the HI symptoms. The benefit seemed to last for a several weeks. The only thing I can put this down to, is the extra oxygen I received during the surgery.

I did a little research on the subject and there does seems to be some research / evidence that "normal" (Normobaric instead of Hyberbaric) oxygen therapy does work well. ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl... This is where patients just sit there with a face mask on and receive oxygen for a set time.

If you have a sympathetic GP it may be worth asking them if your husband can h a ave a session where the GP's / district nurse gives him oxygen for a set period to see if there is any change.

It is an interesting subject, let us know if there

[FlowerPower62 in reply to sospan]

Thanks for that x

[sospan in reply to FlowerPower62]

No problem. Sometimes, I adopt the approach of trying things to see if they work, if they do great if not, then something else to cross off the list.

At least a session with a GP's nurse may be easy to arrange

[Hdo115]

My son had this treatment about 9 months after his hypoxic brain injury and we did notice quite a difference. He become more aware and responsive. In all I think he had in excess of 50 treatments and he is a lot further on that he would have been without it. I believe it was definitely worth all the effort on the part of my daughter-in-law to get him over to the treatment every week and the money it cost. The MS society believe in this too and it is used my many people with MS with noticeable benefits.

The medical profession do not reckon this much, as it is not conventional medicine or treatment, but I am convinced it works.

Try and look on you tube - there is a lot of information and films on people who have been really helped by this

[FlowerPower62 in reply to Hdo115]

I'll do that, thanks. It's been 10 months now, so possibly too late, by the time we do it. X

[Hdo115 in reply to FlowerPower62]

That will not matter better late than never - I am sure he will improve - in America this is so expensive that people have to travel to Canada for it as it is highly rated. I cannot remember how much the sessions cost but it was worth every penny