A Million Little Pieces Of My Mind

My daughter bought three sessions in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber. I previously wrote about my first visit. I timed the second for the day after my cataract surgery, and this one for a week after.

As before, the session was held at the Hyperbaric Med Spa here in Gilbert, where they have two of the tanks. I arrived a little early, but the lady recognized my car and came out to wave me in, as she was already ready for me.

This was my tank. Luckily I haven't lost all the flexibility of my youth, but it's still a little tricky to get into. Still, I took my time as I do these days, and it wasn't so bad.

Then, nothing to do but relax. I'm told many people sleep through the session, but I haven't. Still, with a cellphone and Bing Chat, I was able to do things like inspect the inner controls and gauges.

I'm not sure what the Work indicator indicates, but turning on the light made it possible for me to read a small manual I had brought in with me.

When I stepped into the hyperbaric oxygen chamber, the pressure gauge was at zero. As the session progressed, it climbed all the way up to 54 kilopascals (kPa). That's 54,000 pascals! To put it in perspective, 1 kPa is about the pressure exerted by a 10-g mass resting on a 1-cm² area. So, in my case, it was like having a 540-g mass on every square centimeter of my body. This is significantly higher than the atmospheric pressure at sea level, which is about 101.3 kPa. The increased pressure allowed more oxygen to dissolve in my blood, leading to various therapeutic effects.

I should mention that it doesn't feel like having weight on my body; since it affects every part of my outsides equally, the same as regular atmosphere does, it only changes the pressure differential in my ears.

They had me pinch my nostrils and try to exhale peridically, to equalize the pressure in my inner and outer ears. This is also a technique I used to use when free driving. It's called the Valsalva Maneuver. It's performed by forcibly exhaling against closed lips and a pinched nose, which forces air from the lungs into the middle ear, if the Eustachian tube is open. This maneuver is commonly used to equalize the pressures that affect the middle and outer ear.

Hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) is a well-established treatment that introduces pure oxygen to the body to encourage the natural healing process. The therapy takes place in a pressurized chamber filled with pure oxygen, which allows your body to absorb more oxygen into the plasma and encourages the growth of healthy new tissue where it's needed. This process helps fight off infections and deter cell damage in injuries. HBOT has been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to help treat a range of conditions, including crush injuries, carbon monoxide and cyanide poisoning, severe anemia, sudden vision loss, air or gas embolism, wounds and other soft tissue infections, gas gangrene, chronic pain, delayed radiation injury, acute or reduced blood flow to the arteries, decompression sickness (usually in divers and miners), burns or compromised skin grafts, severe infections that are resistant to antibiotics, and sudden complete hearing loss. (I was here for the healing benefits to my surgery.)

However, there are unapproved uses of hyperbaric oxygen therapy. Some medical spas or alternative medicine centers may claim that hyperbaric oxygen therapy helps treat many other conditions, including age-related symptoms or conditions (anti-aging), autism spectrum disorder (ASD), cerebral palsy, COVID-19, depression, hair loss (alopecia), HIV and AIDS, migraine headaches, sports injuries, and strokes. And it may, but currently there isn't enough research and testing to conclude that hyperbaric oxygen therapy effectively treats these conditions. But it may, so if you can afford it, give it a shot.

In my case, the day after my second session, I had a huge burst of energy and re-arranged my daughter's entire kitchen. (Won't she be surprised!) That would be cool if it happens again, but all I really want is for my eye to heal fast (which it's already doing). So, it's a win!