Hi everyone,

I am back with another update about my hyperbaric oxygen therapy. I have now undergone 23 60-minute treatments in the last 5 weeks. My first 12 treatments were at 1.5 ATA, and the last 11 have been at 1.75 ATA.

The negative side effects I experienced after early HBOT treatments have disappeared. I continue to feel better (mainly, more alert and focused, and less headache-y) during and immediately after HBOT sessions. When I increased from 1.5 to 1.75 ATA, I noticed that this good feeling started earlier in my session, at around 15-20 minutes in rather than 30-40 minutes in.

My condition has continued to improve slowly and steadily. I can now do significantly more activity, and have significantly fewer symptoms.

Below are some numbers that help to communicate my improvement. I track both daily activity and daily symptoms in a spreadsheet on scales from 0 to 25.

For activity,
0 = lying in bed vegetating,
25 = a busy day with a light workout or a stressful situation. What most people would consider "normal".

For symptoms,
0 = no symptoms,
25 = in such agony I cannot move or open my eyes (fortunately, I've never had a day like this).

My current goal is to sustain an activity level of 20 with zero symptoms.

The week before I began HBOT, my average activity level was 11 and my average symptom level was 16. I spent my days lounging around my apartment, reading, napping, and resting. It was a big accomplishment when I walked around the corner to pick up some takeout. I had continual brain fog, was very tired, and occasionally felt nauseous.

The week I first reported on my treatment (March 29), my average activity level increased to 14 and my average symptom level decreased to 12. I still spent most of my days lounging around and napping, but I was able to work for a few hours each day, and I had a couple of days that were quite high-energy (traveling, a friend's wedding, etc.). I still had frequent brain fog and fatigue, but it was no longer constant. The nausea disappeared. Unfortunately, I did start experiencing achy and stiff limbs when I woke up in the morning, an old symptom I hadn't had in a while. My symptoms were erratic: I'd have one day when I felt great, followed by two days of feeling terrible.

This week, my average activity level increased again, to 17, and my average symptom level decreased to 9.5. My symptoms have been much less erratic, and I have really enjoyed my increased energy levels. My sleep has improved a bit and my achiness has been decreasing. On my best day this week, I got up early, walked a half mile to the grocery store, came home, walked a mile to the library, where I spent a couple of hours finishing up my taxes and chatted with a friend I ran into, walked home, cooked lunch, talked on the phone, walked a mile to the mall and back, and stopped at a restaurant for dinner. I did take a nap in the afternoon because of a headache, but for me, this activity level was nothing short of amazing. I'm trying not to have too many days like this, because my main focus is on symptom reduction, and for that I want to rest as much as possible.

So is this improvement due to HBOT? It's really tough to say. As I mentioned before, I usually make slow progress given time and rest, and I don't know if I'm improving more rapidly right now than I did after previous PCS flares.

Additionally, I see one doctor who is both an MD and an acupuncturist. When I saw him last week and described how helpful HBOT has been for me, he gave me some supplements to increase my blood oxygenation levels and cellular energy production at other times of day, too (the main things he gave me were CoQ10, pantothenic acid, and something called ChlorOxygen - chlorophyll in a capsule!). These supplements seem to have also helped my symptoms stabilize at a lower level. Unfortunately, they also make it more difficult to draw conclusions about HBOT.

My neurologist has been pleased with my progress and has told me to "keep doing whatever you're doing". I'm inclined to agree. My plan is to continue HBOT at least until I get to 40 sessions, and possibly for longer. I do not want to oversell the benefits of this treatment, as it's extremely unclear how much of my improvement I should attribute to it, but it seems to be working for me and I want to maximize my chances of continuing to progress.

Again, I hope this is helpful for anyone considering HBOT, and I'm happy to answer questions.