Organizing for America | Len Ochs's Blog: Seeking help for us to help our brain injured veterans.

Seeking help for us to help our brain injured veterans.

By Len from Sebastopol, CA - Nov 29th, 2008 at 11:23 am EST

Comments | Mail to a Friend | Report Objectionable Content

My partner and I run a mom and pop tiny R&D company. We develop systems and teach physicians, psychologists, etc. how to use the system to treat head injuries. Those who are daring enough to user our system have said they are “stunned” and “incredulous” at the results. (Of course it doesn’t work for everybody; nothing does.) We also designed a system to speed tissue healing and reduce inflammation that echoes what NASA uses only much less expensive and equally or more effective. Both are non-invasive, leave nothing in the body as does medication, and are reasonably fast-acting and easy to use, and much less costly than any other conventional or medical treatment.

There has been one book written about the system (Larsen, Stephen. (2006) The Healing Power of Neurofeedback.), a double-issued of a professional journal (Hammond, Cory: Journal of Neurotherapy, 2006, number 2-3) and a subsequent monograph from that journal. We have users in every continent, perhaps in the low hundreds in number.

The bad news is that our systems are so different from anything psychological or medical in use today that those who haven’t used them are dead set against their use as “impossible” or potentially harmful. Even I, who developed the system, said to myself for over 10 years that these can’t work – in spite of the benefits I and others saw every day. This system for helping the head injured is genuinely new in science.

We had one promising NIH-sponsored pilot study on head injury, published in a reputable journal; yet NIH declined to sponsor another one because of “design defects” in the original study that they approved. We don’t have the prestige to champion our own studies.

After recently training someone from Hong Kong in the use of the system he offered us a chance to conduct a study in China with their head injured earthquake victims. They would supply all the experimenters, statistical and experimental design help, data analyzers, food, transportation, and lodging for us. We are tentatively scheduled to spend next October, 2009 in China to conduct the study.

However, we have our own head-injured troops in every VA and military hospital in the world. I would much rather ask you for help for just as much support as China will offer. I’ll design the study and let the study results demonstrate its value. Please help nascent technologies; keep it American; and discover something new and effective that will help our veterans.

I am a 65-year old psychologist and my partner is a 64-year old clinical nurse specialist. Our web site: www.ochslabs.com

Reader Comments	Comments RSS
Comments are closed for this post.

Thank you Len | Report to Admin

By Stephanie from Peoria, AZ Dec 10th 2008 at 7:34 pm EST (Updated Dec 10th 2008 at 7:34 pm EST)

Thank you Len, for your comment and all the work you’ve done in this field. All of us who are in neurotherapy share the problem of ignorance about what we do. The revelation that the brain is not a static organ without hope of rejuvenation should be of immense interest to everyone in this country dealing with ADHD, mild cognitive impairment, depression, anxiety, memory loss, traumatic brain injury and PTSD just to name a few. Over thirty years of scientific research has shown the effectiveness of neurotherapies that are non-invasive and virtually free of harmful side effects to enhance brain function and repair prior damage. If the pharmaceutical companies had been half as successful, they would be hailed as the next coming. But because it is a non-traditional medical technique, it has been likened to “snake oil sold on the back of a horse-drawn wagon”.
I recently had a TBI patient who had spent four months at Barrows Neurological Institute with no progress. Her neurologist had put her on several medications and told her to go home and wait, it would take years to heal.
She arrived at the office unable to walk on her own. She was helped in by a family friend. She was having trouble sleeping and had constant migraine headaches and neck pain. She cried easily and couldn’t remember places or directions. She got lost even in her own neighborhood and was unable to find her husband’s office which she had managed for years.
After only 20 sessions she had made remarkable recovery. She was driving herself. She no longer got lost, she stopped the constant crying and her migraine headaches were gone. She was no longer on any medication except an occasional Ibuprophen. The patient was so excited she went back to her neurologist to show him what remarkable progress she’d made. His response was “You’re obviously just ready to be well now.”
Education is important for this field to survive. Not only for clients, but for those doctors who find it too hard to look at anything outside the allopathic mindset.
Thank you again for all you do.
Stephanie Reese
BrainAdvantage
Link

Content on blogs in My.BarackObama represents the opinions of community members and in no way should be interpreted as endorsed or approved by the campaign.