Life After Football: Improving Brains with HBOT
Happy Fall everyone! We don’t know about y’all, but fall is one of our favorite times of the year! The leaves are changing colors, the heat is retreating (albeit begrudgingly), and football is back! As our friends, family, and heroes get ready to strap on their pads and helmets, an undeniable reality has darkened proceedings these past few years.
Concussions, along with their persistent side effects, will be experienced by many of these athletes. It’s an unavoidable consequence of a game beloved by millions. However, concern about their long term health prospects has led many players to be fearful, and some have preemptively retired.
Most football players, if not all, will suffer from some form of cognitive impairment due to the sheer number of concussive and subconcussive impacts they experience in their playing careers. Studies have shown that someone who plays four years of high school football has absorbed 6,000 to 7,200 subconcussive hits. That’s quite a scary number, especially when you consider the consequences. Researchers at Purdue showed “the effects of repetitive blows to the head are cumulative” which is not good news for football players.
Excitingly, there is growing research to show that Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy, or HBOT, has been shown to dramatically improve the outcomes of people dealing with persistent post-concussion symptoms. A 2017 study showed that 40 sessions of HBOT led to “statistically significant improvements in post concussion and PTSD symptoms, memory, cognitive functions, depression, anxiety, sleep, and quality of life.” Even if the injuries were sustained years before, HBOT is shown to improve symptoms, and help heal the long term damage of consistent head injuries.
A famous example of how HBOT can help football players and other athletes with concussions is Super Bowl winning quarterback, Joe Namath. When he was experiencing the effects of a long career in football, he turned to HBOT to help with his brain health. After doing 120 sessions, Joe says his brain “looked normal all over” on SPECT scans. Since then, he has made it his goal to share his experience in the hopes that others will benefit from HBOT. “This could help millions,” he said.
We have seen these results first hand in our clinics at ATX Hyperbarics! We can help recreate these same protocols in our state-of-the-art hard-shell chambers, and get you or your loved ones on the road to recovery faster! Give us a call today, or click here to book your first appointment!
