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Hyperbaric oxygen: The Basics

Henry's Gas Law represents the basis for Hyperbaric oxygen therapy. 

If you take a liquid and place a gas next to it, the gas that will be dissolved into the liquid is is at an amount proportional to the pressure of the gas.  The higher the pressure of the gas, the higher amount of gas will be dissolved into the liquid. There is a 10 -15 fold increase of oxygen in the plasma under hyperbaric conditions.

In Hyperbaric Chambers, as we increase the pressure, and the oxygen is dissolved in the plasma at a higher rate and we can saturate tissues with oxygen levels up to 10x the normal levels.

The end result of hyperbaric oxygen therapy is to provide an oxygen rich environment for tissue metabolism

Hyperbaric oxygen: primary effects

Hyperoxygenation - There is a 10 -15 fold increase of oxygen in the plasma after hyperbaric treatment. 

Unrestricted flow - Hyperoxygenated plasma can still enter the area where blood vessels and capillaries are injured or narrowed and red blood cells cannot enter.

Tissue Saturation - Oxygen in the hyperoxygenated plasma diffuses naturally to the tissues (from an area of high concentration to low concentration) and provides up to 10x the normal levels of tissue oxygen.

Time of effect - Elevated oxygen in the plasma return to normal within 10 minutes after a Hyperbaric Treatment, but oxygen tensions can be elevated for up to 4 hours in subcutaneous tissues.  

Hyperbaric oxygen: secondary effects

Less Edema -  Hyperbaric oxygen causes up to a 20% reduction in regional blood flow and edema, but because oxygen content is up 15 times normal the tissues still get dramatically more oxygen.

Increased Collagen Production - Hyperbaric Oxygen  dramatically increases Fibroblast proliferation which produce collagen. 

Improved Immune Activity - Hyperbaric Oxygen allows for the appropriate oxygen tension for Neutrophils to engulf and kill bacteria

Better Bone Repair - Hyperbaric oxygen enhances osteoblastic activity (whose function decreases in low oxygen tissues). 

Antimicrobial - Hyperbaric oxygen affects anaerobic organisms such as clostridia, bacteroides, staph and strep and kills some fungi as well. 

Stem Cell Release - Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy mobilizes stem cells from the bone marrow and stimulates stem cells to release growth factors.

Blood Vessel Generation - Hyperbaric treatment encourages angiogenesis (new blood vessels to grow).

Hyperbaric Oxygen & neurology

Hyperbaric Therapy has a wealth of research data for uses in Neurology.
Mechanisms include - preservation of damaged tissue,  improving cerebral metabolism, reducing oxidative stress and Stem Cell Mobilization 

Stroke:  Neubauer and End (1980) used Hyperbaric Therapy in 122 stroke patients with and 65% reported improvement in the quality of life and spent fewer days in the hospital.

In a randomized controlled trial by Efrati et al. (2013) on 74 patients who suffered a stroke up to 36 months before inclusion, HBO therapy led to significant neurological.

Alzheimer's: Harch 2018 discusses a case report of a 58-year-old female was diagnosed with Alzheimer's dementia which was rapidly progressive. After 40 Hyperbaric treatments, she reported increased memory, concentration, sleep, conversation, appetite, ability to use the computer and more good days (5/7) than bad days. 

TBI: Harch et al. 2012, looked at Hyperbaric oxygen in 16 war veterans with traumatic brain injury: 40 sessions were given in 30 days and 80% of the subjects reported an improvement in the majority of their symptoms in areas such as: headache, sleep, and short term memory. 

MS: Oriani et al (1990) studied 44 MS patients - 22 in the 100% oxygen group and 22 in the compressed air group both receiving over a 1 year period with 14/22 reported benefits in the Hyperbaric oxygen group versus 2 in the Hyperbaric air group reporting benefit.

For most neurological injury the Hyperbaric pressure range is 1.5 - 2.0 ATA.

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Hyperbaric oxygen & sports

Reduction of edema and inflammation, new blood vessel and bone formation as well as stimulation of collagen production and stem cell release are well known Hyperbaric effects that are applicable to sports injury. 

Fatigue: Ishii et al (2005) reported the use of Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy for muscular fatigue in seven Olympic athletes during the Nagano Olympics and all seven athletes benefited from Hyperbaric therapy with faster recovery rates. 

Injury: Ishii et al (1999) looked at 22 athletes with various injuries using Hyperbaric treatment between 1.3 and 2.0 ATA and more than 70% of the patients experienced improvement. 

Joint injury: Staples (1996) found that ankle sprain patients treated with Hyperbaric Oxygen improved 30% faster.

CTE: Stoller (2011) published a case reports on sports related TBI/CTE where a retired NFL player in his 50's with numerous prior concussions in his career was treated for 40 treatments and marked improvements were seen in processing speed, cognitive function, memory and reasoning.

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Hyperbaric oxygen & cvd

Hyperbaric Oxygen has significant effect on the cardiovascular system and as such has been studied in the treatment of numerous diseases of cardiovascular origin. 

Arterial Ulcers: Hart and Strauss (1979) used Hyperbaric Oxygen at 2.0 ATA to treat 16 patients with treatment resistant arteriosclerosis related ulcers and in 75 % of cases, the ulcers healed completely. 

Veinous Ulcers: Bass (1970) used Hyperbaric Oxygen in 19 patients with resistant venous stasis ulcers and complete relief was obtained in 17 of 19 cases at 2.0 ATA.

Angina: Goliakov et al. (1986) Looked at 40 patients with angina pectoris and Hyperbaric treatment was shown to produce a favorable effect in 84 % of the patients.

PVD: Visona et al. (1989) treated patients with various stages of peripheral vascular disease and 70% had improved clinical symptoms with long-term improvement in more than 50 % of the patients.

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Hyperbaric oxygen & autoimmunity

Hyperbaric Oxygen has been studied in numerous autoimmune diseases.
Mechanisms include - downregulation of cytokines and upregulation of growth factors

Psoriasis: Butler (2009) showed good results in two patients with with the use of multiple sessions of Hyperbaric Oxygen at 2.8 ATA for 60 min.

RA: Lukich et al. (1991) treated 35 patients with rheumatoid arthritis with Hyperbaric Oxygen. Each patient received 21 sessions of 1.7 ATA for 40 min and good clinical results were obtained. 

IBD: A systematic review by Dulai 2014 looked the effect of Hyperbaric Oxygen in 17 studies involving 613 patients with Inflammatory Bowel Disease of which 286 were diagnosed as Crohn’s disease and 327 as Ulcerative Colitis.  The overall response rate to Hyperbaric treatment in Crohn’s disease patients was 86 % and in Ulcerative Colitis 88 %.

MS:  Fischer (1983) studied 40 chronic MS patients - the experimental group received pure Hyperbaric oxygen, and the placebo group received 10 per cent Hyperbaric oxygen. 

Objective improvement (mobility, fatigue, balance and bladder function) occurred in 12 of 17 MS patients treated with hyperbaric oxygen and in 1 of 20 patients treated with placebo

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Hyperbaric OXygen & cancer

Substantial data exists that Hyperbaric Oxygen can potentially enhance other Alternative Cancer treatments such as IV Vitamin C in addition to being a well established treatment for radiation induced  tissue necrosis. 

Tumor angiogenesis creates immature and leaky blood vessels which are unable to adequately perfuse the entire tumor with oxygen. This leads to the formation of hypoxic (low oxygen) regions and upregulates HIF-1.  

One of the major challenges in the treatment of cancer is the occurrence of local hypoxia within the central tumour areas. The application of HBOT may help overcome the problem of oxygen deficiency in the poorly oxygenated areas of neoplastic tissue.

The ketogenic diet, ketone supplementation, and HBOT target overlapping metabolic pathways which are especially prominent in metastatic cells. 

Poff and D’Agostino (2013) studied the VM-M3 mouse model of metastatic cancer and found the ketogenic diet alone significantly decreased tumor growth, and increased mean survival time by 56.7% in mice with systemic metastatic cancer. Whereas combining the Ketogenic diet with Hyperbaric Oxygen had a 77.9% increase in mean survival time.

Hyperbaric Oxygen alone did not influence cancer progression, which mirrors what has been suggested in numerous reviews that Hyperbaric Oxygen itself is neutral to cancer and simply enhances other therapies. 

SEE OUR HYPERBARIC OXYGEN & CANCER SECTION

Ketogenic & HBOT

CANCER, IV vitamin c & hbot

Dr. Dominic D’Agostino and his group conducted experiments with regards to IV Vitamin C and Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy again using mouse VM-M3 Cells  WHICH were treated with a less than cytotoxic concentration of Vitamin C(<0.5mM) and one session of HBOT (100% O2 for 60 minutes at 2.5 ATA) and found HBOT and 0.3mM Vitamin C had significantly enhanced cytotoxicity compared to all other treatments. 

In the article "Increasing the Effectiveness of Intravenous Vitamin C as an Anticancer Agent" one group has published "We propose the utilization of hyperbaric oxygen immediate­ly after IV vitamin C therapy to increase its effectiveness as an anticancer agent, in order to increase the formation of hydrogen per­oxide, and therefore enhance the anticancer effect of IV vitamin C."

IVc & HBOT

Questions about Hyperbaric Chambers?

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