I am panic and asking all members (starting with Goodscout and all members who so kindly responding to Goodscout) for an urgent advice: I have been having PCS since an accident to the head on June 12, 2008. As most of you, I am extremely worried and depressed thinking I may stuck with this for the rest of my life, or I may never heal, and sometimes the occasional relapses really scared me out. But 2 days ago, I have this rough coughing and I could not help it trying to get the phlegm off my lungs. Unfortunately, at one point, I could feel the rough cough got to my brain, really "touched" my injured brain, which I have been avoiding to do for fearing of relapse. Well, I have been dizzy for 2 days, and today the 3rd day, I am more dizzy than the last 2 days, and very very nauseous, even during a quick phone conversation, I felt so nauseous!!! Could this be a bad thing? Should I go to emergency room for a cat scan to see if I may have broken any blood vessel like aneurysm? As I said, I am so scared of this nauseous feeling and the dizziness. It felt like when I first had the accident. Please help me, thank you soooo much for your kind advice!

Hi I am new to this site,

actually the only reason I signed up is because i saw your thread. Im not sure if it has been mentioned here before as I said I am new but I have been getting neurofeedback treatment for my PCS and it has been working. It takes a few sessions but after about ten or twenty you should start to feel much better. I had a mild case of PCS after a wakeboarding accident and it has helped me overcome most of the symptoms. The therapy is called EEG Neurofeedback. I was just skimming through the pages and saw your thread and thaught you needed to know about this treatment.

Good luck

Peter

EEG Neurofeedback can be helpful. It is hard to get insurance to pay for it and at $60 to $120 per hour or session, it can get expensive. Often, it takes 15 to 20 sessions to get real lasting benefits.

It works by training your mind to focus on using a different part of the brain. In some cases, this helps the brain rewire to a better area, usually adjacent to the area that is malfunctioning. This is called neuro-plasticity. In others, it just strengthens the other parts of the brain so they work harder.

Some times, our brains get lazy due to lack of use and do not have a balance that can allow best functioning. It is like offering a task to two people. The busy and energetic one jumps at the job while the lazy one lets the energetic one take the task. Over time, the lazy one gets even lazier.

If the PCS subject has such a lazy area in his brain, the neuro-feedback can help him exercise the lazy area so it picks up more of the mental workload.

Neuro-plasticity is more like having four workers who do different tasks. Two do yard work weekly, one washes windows once a month and one sweeps the driveway every two weeks. If the yard workers get injured, the task of yard work gets directed to the window washer, especially since window washing is not a weekly need. The window washers task can be handled by the driveway sweeper on one of his weeks off and he can help with the yard work on the other week.

The free time of the other two workers got put to use to make up for the injured yard workers.

This plasticity is most notable with someone who has gone blind. The sensory neurons that used to process visual information now are divided and process sound made by his stick and touch of his fingers on the braile pages.

I use this system to listen and think. I often have to close my eyes to concentrate and think or to listen intently to someone as they speak. The brain makes this adaptation quickly, often within a few days.

In my case, both auditory and visual neurons are damaged. When I close my eyes, I have enough visual neurons available to help the auditory neurons do a more thorough job.

I hope this is making sense.

At rehab today, both therapists mentioned being confused by my difficulties because of my high level of functioning. I may be able to accomplish a vast amount of tasks, but my memory is still almost useless and I can get overwhelmed easily.

Hi Everyone,

I am a big proponent of neurofeedback for MTBI (and in some cases, TBI). Mark went into some very good detail on the subject, but, if I may indulge myself, more is needed.

Your brain operates on different frequency levels, basically ranging from 0 - 60 Hz (it goes beyond 60, but thus far the relevant "cognitive" frequencies scientists have found are between 0-60 Hz). These have been grouped into frequency band classifications.
1. Delta Range
0-5 Hz range. The slowest frequency band. Expressed when we are
sleeping or in areas where the brain has been damaged.
2. Theta Range
5-8 Hz range. Still a very slow frequency band. Expressed when we
are first waking up from sleeping, right before you fall asleep,
daydreaming, not focused but awake. This is most prevalent in the
ADD group and in some brain injured people.
5. Alpha Range
8-12 Hz range. This is characteristic of an awake but idol individual.
Someone who is alert, but not doing anything. When you meditate,
this range is expressed. Peak alpha frequency, which is from 10-12
Hz, is associated with high intelligence. People with brain injuries
have a hard time producing this and training often is focused on this
frequency.
6. Beta Range
13-30 Hz. This is the every day frequency band that allows us to
function as human beings. Listening, talking, reading, thinking, etc.
are all done in this frequency range. Actually, too much of this can
cause agitation, anxiety, ruminating, stiff thinking, OCD, etc. Brain
inured patients will often have high levels of delta in one area, and
high levels of beta in another to compensate for the delta.

So, with neurofeedback, usually an assessment is performed to see where your brain is out of whack. Then, the you focus your training parameters on normalizing those EEG wavelenghts that are either too high or too low.

The research that was done on TBI patients with neurofeedback back when dinosaurs roamed the earth found that roughly 68% of the subjects being tested reported getting a 70% improvement in symptoms. This, in my opinion, would now be considered conservative because the technology has come a long way since those studies were done.

Neurofeedback can be very difficult for someone with PCS because you basically have to train around the dead neurons to get the functional ones to re organize and often requires 100+ sessions. However, it isn't impossible. Also, Mark is right in that it can get very expensive if you go to a practitioner. I found a solution to this by buying my own equipment and software. There is a guy who specializes helping out home trainers and he is more than willing to get you anything you need in the areas of equipment, trainint, software, etc. I don't benefit at all if you buy anything from him, so this isn't an endorsement. His name is Pete VanDueesen, and his website is: brain trainer . com. There are also many different forms of neurofeedback equipment you can buy, so it is definitely worth it to put in your research before you purchase. The three that have been extremely effective for brain injury rehab are: 1. The Proshi BB. 2. LENS. 3. 4 channel Z score training. I'll spare you the details on them. You can google them for more info. Also, don't let any neurofeedback practioner/therapist tell you that the technology is too complicate to figure out. That is a bunch of rubbish. It will require some training, but nothing a dvd or online practicum can't teach you. All in all, you can get set up with a basic unit, software and training for around $1500 and you can train on it as much as you want.

There are also a few medications that aren't prescribed in the U.S. which have been used in Europe and Asia since 1970 to treat brain injury. These two are Oxiracitum and Cerebrolysin. They both have undergone tons of research studies and have proven very effective in treating head injuries. They also have neuroprotective properties that are supposed to protect your brain from further injuries, although this is still in debate. It won't prevent you getting a concussion, it just helps minimize the damage occurred. Those of you who have had multiple concussions may want to seriously consider getting on one of these. Although, you would have to import it from Europe, so it may or may not be affordable for you. Just google it and you'll find tons of info on it.

Also, Dr. Daniel Amen has a wonderful website on what supplements and diet you should be on with a brain injury. His office offers free consultations and what stuff you should get - with the idea that you will buy it from them. But either way, it is good info to know. So, it is definitely worth giving them a call.

Last, but certainly not least, is Stem Cell Therapy. With the lift on the research funding ban imposed by President Bush, it is only a matter of 5 years before this becomes a viable option for brain rehabilitation.

I have followed some of the brain oriented stem cell therapy issues. The embryonic stem cell issue is of no value to the brain injured. The study I read reported that embryonic stem cells are not necessarily pluripotent.

They found that there is a risk of the cells developing into non-brain tissue. They have observed tooth cells and other non-brain cells developing in the brains of test subjects.

They found that there was a greater success from stem cells developed from the patient's skin cells. This technology is advancing quickly. The autologous donation is also a great risk reducer. The technology is called induced Pluripotent Stem Cells. iPSC. The research is ongoing in La Jolla California and shows great promise.

Regarding the neurofeedback self training, my research shows that the LENS system may be the most effective. The problem with self training is that some of the malfunctions are not as evident as the promoters claim.

I was evaluated by one of the pioneers in QEEG and neurofeedback. He broke down the wave forms into minuscule time resolutions to pinpoint the dysfunction. More common problems like OCD and ADD/ADHD are the easiest to treat. The more minute errors are harder to treat. He did not offer neurofeedback for my condition.

Dr Amen has a lot of interesting ideas. Some are valuable. Others are quite questionable, especially for the brain injured. His focus is more oriented toward human potential issues. I was looking into his clinic (The Amen Clinic) before my most recent and debilitating injury. At the time, he was only operating out of his Fairfield California Clinic. He was a frequent guest on San Fransisco area TV talk shows. Since he went commercial, his claims have become a bit more extreme.

http://www.arrowsmithschool.org/

http://www.positscience.com/products/

http://www.sharpbrains.com/

http://www.mindsparke.com/brain_fitness_pro.php

For every scientific article that disputes the claims against Embyronic Stem Cell research (and there are very few to my knowledge), I could show you a dozen that report it's benefits. Despite what you hear or read in the news, Embryonic Stem Cells right now are the best source for cell therapy simply because you don't have to reverse engineer them, so the process of using them is less cumbersome. That, of course, doesn't mean that new techniques aren't in the process of being perfected to make it easier to use adult stem cells, but for right now the cells of choice in many research studies are embryonic. They can also be induced into pluripotent stem cells, such as neural stem cells (NSC's). A lot of the studies I have read that talk about injecting stem cells into rats, and other lower organisms, and observing nails, teeth, etc. growing were done when stem cells were first being researched were done a few years back when the science was new. The science has evolved since then and I don't believe anyone would just inject multi potent stem cells into an organism anymore (but I could be wrong). As a matter of fact, many Universities are beginning human trials this year. Researchers have also found that the stem cells also come with a ton of nerve growth factors that induce your own stem cells to begin growing and repairing damaged tissue. Also, the nervous system is what is termed "immuno privileged" (because an immune reaction inside of your nervous system would, essentially, begin to destroy your own nerve cells, the nervous system has a very weak immune response to any foreign bodies), so when you do transplant embyronic stem cells into a nervous system, they are not rejected by the host (at least not from the studies they have done thus far). So, that takes care of the autologous question. However, immune rejection will pose a problem with the other organs of the body. The reason, I believe, why scientists in America are so busy trying to find ways to make stem cells from your own body is to eliminate the ethical dilemma of using aborted fetuses, and because of the aforementioned immune rejection response of other organ systems. So the fact that Mark has claimed that embryonic stem cell therapy is of no use to an injured brain is completely ridiculous and should be disregarded. I just don't see the logic behind it. If it is because of personal moral reasons Mark, then that is completely understandable. However, you shouldn't get into the habit of discrediting science just because you don't personally believe in the methods used to carry out the research (sorry, that is my little soap box rant from being a research scientists years ago who was constantly pestered by the P.E.T.A people for our use with animal models).
But quite honestly, the research is so new and controversial that no one really knows what will come of it. The only thing that we do know is that, as Mark put it very well, the research is happening very quickly and has thus far shown great promise. I do know that they are currently doing stem cell therapy (embyronic and adult) in other countries and are seeing some pretty amazing results from it, albeit they are all anecdotal. A great example is of a girl from Fort Collins, CO who was diagnosed with some sort of vision disorder (sorry, can't remember which one off the top of my head), was considered legally blind and was told she would never be able to drive a car. She traveled to China, received adult stem cell therapy on her eyes, and a couple of months later, got her drivers license. There are other similar stories that can be found through google.


I'm sorry to hear Mark that the person you saw never recommended neurofeedback for you. If you don't mind me asking, who was it? Also, have you even tried to do it to see if it would be beneficial or not?

I live in CT and am looking for a well trained, skilled and experienced Homeopath or doctor specializing in PCS in my area.

My 15 year old daughter had a Traumatic Brain Injury in Jan 2008 and has not recovered. She hit the left back side of her head on the ice when sled riding. It is labeled as Post Concussion Syndrome. She gets a headache when she is exposed to loud noise, reading, concentrating, light changes or even physical activity. This headache is not very painful necessarily but it causes her to have to stop activity and rest. It makes her not be able to remember what she has studied or continue to study. She is unable to attend school. We have to keep her in quiet envirionments and modify all her activities. Otherwise, she suffers the consequences of the over exposure to her brain.

If she rests and the headache does not relent it can continue to get worse until she can only whisper, then not speak, tears run down her checks yet she is not crying and then her body begins to shake arms and legs like a seizure. She can answer by shaking her head but not speak. She can't squeeze your hand but a little pressure with her thumb. It lasts about 10 to 20 minutes. Afterward she is very tired and needs to sleep, she will easily get headaches and not be able to study for 3 to 5 days afterwards. She will have periods of blurred vision, dizziness or nausea.

Thank you for your suggestions.

Hi Linda,

I would suggest looking into neurofeedback. Just google it and you'll find loads of info on its use for brain injury rehabilitation. It basically teaches the brain to act normally again through conditioning. You could also look into hyperbaric oxygen therapy. Good luck.

To: mhr4,
Thank you for responding. We did do hyperbaric oxygen 40 one-hour treatments Nov 2008 - December 2008. It was expensive and no difference in her major symptoms except she seemed less tired in the evenings. We also tried the neuro-feedback about 4 times but it gave her a really bad headache. She didn't want to continue.
Again Thank you - Linda