India. Post stroke rehabilitation. The missing link & Hyperbaric oxygen therapy

Dr. Efrati and his colleagues had half the study participants undergo hyperbaric oxygen treatment for two hours daily five times a week for a total of forty sessions. The second control group received no treatment for two months, followed by two months of hyperbaric treatments. The researchers found that the patients who received hyperbaric treatment in the first two months showed remarkable clinical improvements including increased sensation, language skills, and movement ability—even if it had been years since the initial damage. Neuroimaging analyses also showed significant increased neural activity in damaged brain areas. The results were published in PLoS ONE earlier this year.

“After a brain injury, you’ll see several types of brain damage. The most severe is necrosis. That tissue is dead and nothing can be done. But surrounding that necrotic tissue, you see areas that still have some metabolic function. Those areas can be improved,” says Efrati. He argues that those cells are compromised, with enough metabolic activity to stay alive but not enough to fire and promote action potentials. The extra oxygen delivered by hyperbaric treatment, over time, helps those cells heal and regain normal metabolic function and firing potential.

Efrati and his team are currently running two similar trials on people with traumatic brain injury and Alzheimer’s.

Dr. Shai Efrati is the director of the [Sagol center for hyperbaric medicine and research](http://www.assafh.org/sites/en/Pages/Hyperbaric-Chamber-New.aspx) at Assaf-Harofeh Medical Center in Israel. The center, under Dr. Efrati management, has become the largest most occupied hyperbaric center worldwide, currently treating more than 120 patients per day. Dr. Efrati is also the director of Research & Development of Assaf-Harofeh Medical center, affiliated to Tel-Aviv University. Taking the two passions/positions together Dr. Efrati has initiated a research program focusing on the neuroplasticity (regeneration of brain tissue) of Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy (HBOT). In the first clinical studies it was proved that HBOT can induce neuroplasticity in post stroke and Traumatic Brain Injury even years after the acute Insult. The important clinical results gained from the research program have led to fruitful cooperation including multidiscipline team focusing on regeneration of injured brain due to early stages of dementia, vascular disease and anoxic brain damage as well as other "aging" tissues.