BIOFEEDBACK


Can you imagine pulling back a curtain and being able to look directly into your body, seeing how parts of it are working?

What if you could see how tight your muscles are right now?
Or what happens to your heart rhythm when you're stressed or frustrated or angry?
Or how much your breathing or blood flow or skin responds to anxious thoughts or stressful self-talk?

And that while watching your muscles or your heart rate variability or your breathing, you experiment with thinking/moving/doing activities to see what changes occur in your body?
It is possible to do exactly this with biofeedback.

BIOFEEDBACK (or "feedback about the body") means using sensitive monitors to give us information about body responses that we don't usually notice. Seeing these changes can help you identify stress triggers and the strategies which most effectively get you to calm, relaxed, healthy levels.

Biofeedback is a learning tool, not a magic pill or instant cure. The goal of biofeedback is to use these accurate, instantaneous signals from your own body for learning and enhanced self-awareness. With training and practice, you become more sensitive to body responses, and no longer need the biofeedback monitors to be aware of what is happening or how to change it. Biofeedback of your muscle tension levels, breathing patterns, heart rate variability, blood flow changes, skin responses and brain wave patterns is an interesting (and fun!) way to help yourself learn to regulate their levels for stronger performance (academic, athletic, performing arts, business), deeper relaxation, and better health.

The U.S. National Institute of Health (NIH) findings confirm that biofeedback can be effective in working with :

Other current areas of research where biofeedback is a promising strategy are: diabetes, high blood pressure, blepharospasm, bulemia nervosa, cardiac arrythmias, ADD/ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder), panic and anxiety disorders, carpal tunnel syndrome, phantom limb pain, post traumatic headache, myofascial pain, TMJ pain, and an interesting variety of other specialized areas. Visit www.aapb.org for an up-to-date list of health conditions where research has shown biofeedback to be equally, or sometimes more effective, than medications.

The body responses most often monitored to provide biofeedback include:

All of these continue to be actively researched to learn even more about their value in health and performance applications. Muscle tension biofeedback, peripheral skin temperature biofeedback and electrodermal activity are currently the most utilized because they have proven to be useful in a variety of applications and consistently report positive results with certain health conditions. There is a great interest and growth in neurofeedback for attention and performance, and this field is expanding rapidly.

The proven successes of biofeedback have led some insurance companies to reimburse for biofeedback as an accepted treatment for a growing range of health-related problems. It is so effective that the military uses it to train individuals to reduce stress and stay well.
Some reports of unsuccessful biofeedback training have appeared in the research literature since the inception of biofeedback training more than four decades ago. Many of the unsuccessful studies were conducted in the early development of the field of biofeedback and reflect the failure to thoroughly train individuals. For example, studies provided only minimal training with the biofeedback instruments (often 1 to 4 sessions), provided little coaching, involved no home practice and failed to train to clinical criteria.

Currently, biofeedback guidelines list 8 to 20 sessions as a reasonable length of training when there is good practice adherence and no other disorder present. (Neurofeedback will customarily take more sessions in order to truly learn new response patterns using current instrumentation and tested protocols). When a person has psychological or health problems that interfere with learning self-regulation or with changing or eliminating symptoms, then other treatments or therapy may be needed before biofeedback training can be effective.

Click on biofeedback resources for further sources on biofeedback websites, books, journals, organizations, equipment, professional training programs, and finding certified professionals.


BIOFEEDBACK AT THE STRESS MANAGEMENT AND HIGH PERFORMANCE CLINIC

The Stress Management and High Performance Clinic provides :

The biofeedback sessions are provided by Kathy Somers who is certified in biofeedback. Self-regulation in these areas will also be of interest to those individuals who wish biofeedback training to improve their management of such things as : and for enhancing performance in For further information about biofeedback or arranging private biofeedback appointments at the Stress Management and High Performance Clinic, do not hesitate to call Kathy Somers at 519 824-4120, ext. 52662. Please leave a message so I can return your call.




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