Posted by GBoogie on February 26, 2004 at 14:12:55:

Have any of you ever heard of Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy (HBOT)?

Have any of you with 'brain fog' ever had a 'functional' brain scan? Not a CT or an MRI, which is considered a 'structural' scan, but rather a PET, SPECT, or fMRI? And if you did have a functional brain scan, did it show a decrease in cerebral blood flow or function?

The reason I ask is that I recently ran across some very interesting information about HBOT which could be very helpful to anybody that has experienced cognitive deficits due to OSA. I still think the first step is to get your OSA treatment under control. However, if you have gotten your OSA under control, and your cognitive improvement has hit a plateau, HBOT could help you get to the next level.

Of course, I am not a doctor, and this is not intended as medical advice, etc. etc.

Admittedly, HBOT is currently controversial and has had a somewhat checkered past from what I have read, especially back in the 1970s. Not all the claims made back then held up. However, with the development of functional brain scans, it should now be much easier to determine HBOT's effectiveness. After all, the SPECT scans should speak for themselves as objective measurements.

Conventional Wisdom said that once the brain was injured, say after a stroke or auto accident, that it couldn't get better after the condition stabilized a few weeks or months after the injury. HBOT proponents think that an injured brain may indeed contain an area of 'dead' neurons that will never recover, but it usually also contains an area of poorly functioning but recoverable neurons; 'idling' neurons they call them. This area, or penumbra, of 'idling' neurons can be reactivated through the application of pure oxygen under pressure. And, they have the SPECT scans to back up their thesis.

None of the articles I read about HBOT discusses OSA specifically. They discuss stroke, near-hanging, near-drowning, carbon monoxide poisoning, smoke inhalation and other conditions that lead to either anoxia or hypoxia. Usually, these patients suffered a decrease of oxygen just once. Patients with OSA usually suffer intermittent hypoxia, often hundreds of times each night. Perhaps there are some similarities in the insult to the brain and therefore a reason why HBOT might help 'brain fog' sufferers, too.

Anoxia and hypoxia cause problems to a near-hanging or near-drowning victim long after the person is rescued and able to breathe room air (or pure oxygen at room pressure) again. It appears that after a hypoxic/anoxic insult to the brain there is a permanent reduction in blood flow to some areas of the brain. This is because the capillaries in that area got damaged during the insult. The normal flow of oxygen via red blood cells does not return after the crisis is over. Edema or swelling of the brain often occurs because the capillaries can't remove fluid like they should. And the blood/brain barrier starts letting in things it shouldn't.

Breathing oxygen though a mask or nasal cannula should help you completely saturate your red blood cells, which is good. However, breathing oxygen under pressure forces oxygen to dissolve into your blood's plasma as well as your lymph fluid and cerebrospinal fluid. This allows oxygen to travel into the tiniest of spaces that are too small for even a red blood cell to go. HBOT often leads to tissue oxygen saturation 20 times higher than normal.

Fortunately, hyperoxia, or a high level of oxygen, also has effects that last long after the patient is returned to room air. There are at least 3 benefits to HBOT. First it supplies oxygen to cells that are 'idling' because they have been 'knocked off the grid' out of reach of the red blood cells due to damage to the capillaries near them. Second, it reduces edema by causing vasoconstriction. Third, it leads to the growth of new capillaries, or angiogenisis. On top of that, is also thought to help the blood/brain barrier heal and promote phagocytosis, which both help remove impurities from the brain.

I'm not a doctor, but.... looking at the SPECT scans in some of the articles was pretty impressive.

For those of you with 'brain fog' I suggest you read more about HBOT and draw your own conclusions.

If anybody here has any experience with it, I'd love to know how it worked out for you.

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