The US has seen
an increase in conditions that impact brain health; 48% of Veterans returning
from combat who seek VA treatment are diagnosed with a mental health problem.
The rate of reported sports-related concussions has doubled in the past decade.
And diagnoses for neurological disorders such as ADHD and dementia have been
steadily increasing. Though there are
cases in which medication is absolutely necessary, there are growing concerns
about the rapid rise and abuse of psychotropic prescriptions without a proper
evaluation by a mental health professional. Medication can provide
supplementation or re-uptake certain chemicals that cause these symptoms, but
take away the medication and the chemical processes still haven’t been cured. By
doing EEG neurofeedback training, you’re teaching the neurons to release
chemicals and to communicate in specific patterns. And by reinforcing those
patterns, the neurons actually learn to communicate in a process called long
term potentiation. The problem is that this information is hard to collect,
requiring data collection using multiple measurement systems and hours of
cross-specialty analysis.
So while
neurofeedback and heart rate variability (HRV) training have been shown in a
multitude of peer reviewed literature publications to be effective in
remediation the negative effects of central and autonomic nervous system trauma
such as concussion and PTSD, the roadblocks in knowledge and access keep
physicians from practicing them. The team developed a system that puts all of
the software, hardware and education in one accessible, easy-to-use place. They
also provide a multifaceted education program with training manuals, bi-monthly
live webinars and over 250 research references so that doctors can read the
original studies behind specific parts of their tools. The system is a portable
brain-computer interface that allows physicians to assess the extent and
specific locations of brain injury by conducting EEG readings using a special
device fondly called the ‘Michael Phelps’ due to its swim cap-like appearance.
Heart and breath rate are also measured, giving the physician a full picture of
a patient’s central and autonomic nervous systems. Physicians can create a
training program that targets those specific brain areas that are not
performing optimally to get them to fire and wire together.
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