August Is (Was) National Immunization Awareness Month

The CDC wants to remind you that immunization is (was) "one of the most significant public health achievements of the 20th century," as we lament its wide disrepute in the 21st. Vaccine pioneer Dr Thomas C. Peebles died earlier this month, Tara Parker-Pope wrote an illuminating piece on whooping cough, the federal government did its bit with NIAM, and still no hoopla or a single PSA in the mainstream news. These days our best shot at disease prevention gets no respect.

Maybe the Internet has stirred up public mistrust. Maybe there's an evidence-based argument we're missing. What constantly surprises, though, is the confusion among otherwise well-informed, practicing physicians.

We saw a frank and fair airing of the issue in "The Vaccine War" on PBS's Frontline in April. Others, like the Alliance for Natural Health, watched the same program and saw media bias and a cover-up.

In certain circles of hyperbaric medicine, the criticism of vaccines has not been limited to autism, where a rather significant segment of patients, families, and providers believes vaccines contain toxins that cause the disorder. Lately we've also been monitoring claims that HBOT is an effective treatment for seizure-related disorders allegedly caused by human papillomavirus (HPV) immunizations.

These developments merit our brief undivided attention, later this week, with some helpful information about how the medical community and public health authorities monitor the safety of vaccines.

O2.O is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent web guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy.

Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: Viral Link Confirmed

A study published in last week's Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences provides more strong evidence that chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) is caused by a retrovirus. Four previous studies had failed to confirm the promising findings published in the October 2009 issue of Science, which had pinpointed the xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related virus (XMRV). The new evidence implicates different members of the same class of murine leukemia virus (MLV). Investigators found MLV-related virus gene sequences in 32 of 37 (86.5%) patients with CFS but in just 3 of 44 (6.8%) healthy blood donors.

CLICK HERE to read the New York Times coverage of the study and the ensuing debate among leading researchers.

Clearly these findings bring new hope and energy to the field of CFS research, along with serious new concerns for the safety of our nation's blood supply. But they change our view of the evidence on HBOT for chronic fatigue syndrome not a whit. Scant. The viral connection does, however, raise a topic that has been occupying our minds lately. Vaccines. More soon to follow.

O2.O is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent web guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy.

Weekly Web Roundup: 29 August 2010

With this back-to-school installment of our regular weekend update we manage to find a few choice headlines from another pretty slow hyperbaric news week. Do you have any bulletins you would like us to post? Is your hyperbaric oxygen therapy facility listed (completely and accurately) in our treatment center directory? All you have to do is submit a comment below or contact us.

SCIENCE

A new clinical trial supported by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) will use laser speckle imaging (LSI) technology to measure blood flow velocity at wound sites in patients receiving HBOT versus patients receiving standard care. The WoundImager device was developed by CW Optics, Seaford VA.

PATIENT STORIES

Last Sunday a SCUBA diver suffering the bends was saved with the nimble assistance of the SOS Hyperlite Hyperbaric Stretcher based at Health Centre of the Haute-Côte-Nord, Québec. The rescue marks the first Canadian use of the device.

Australian surfing great Joel "Parko" Parkinson does an interview from inside the hyperbaric chamber in which he's recovering from a badly cut foot.

NEW HBOT CENTERS

In adding Lorain Community Hospital, Lorain OH, to our files we discover 8 other facilities enjoying the innovative services of Cleveland-based Mobile Hyperbaric Centers, Inc.

A hyperbaric chamber at Bronson Methodist Hospital, Kalamazoo MI, makes at least a photo appearance in a story on its parent group's financial success.

Jordan Hospital, Plymouth MA, opens a Wound Healing and Hyperbaric Center, "the only hospital-based hyperbaric treatment chamber in the greater Plymouth and Cape Cod region."

More publicity, and the story of a woman recovering from radionecrosis, acquaints us with another location of Harrington Hospital, in Charlton MA, operating a wound care center in partnership with Diversified Clinical Services.

We learn of the wound healing center at Galesburg Cottage Hospital, Galesburg IL, with the granting of privileges to Sherwin Parungao, MD. The hospital operates the center in partnership with National Healing.

BodyNew MedSpa, Scottsdale AZ, invites its pampered clientele into maybe the coziest hard chamber ever photographed.

Bon Secours Charity Health System facilities in Suffern, Warwick, and Port Jervis NY all provide HBOT.

HyOx Medical Treatment Center adds to its Marietta location a new facility on the campus of Gwinnett Medical Center, Lawrenceville GA.

O_2.0 is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy treatment centers, physicians and clinicians, diseases and conditions.

It's No Game: Wii Fit For Concussion Rehab

We never would have guessed the next big medical device for traumatic brain injury would come in a box from Nintendo. But the Washington Post tells us more and more college athletic programs are using Wii Fit to help players manage their rehabilitation from concussion.

Trainers find the Wii simple, affordable, and extraordinarily popular with athletes. Of course the game system is only one small part of a broader approach to the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of traumatic brain injury (TBI) in athletes. As we reported yesterday, serious or repeated head injury in young athletes may add up to a TBI that, in later life, can mimic other neurologic diseases like ALS and Alzheimer's.

Rehabilitation physicians and physical therapists also use Wii Fit to help patients with prosthetic limbs regain their balance.

O2.O is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent web guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy.

TBI Sometimes Misdiagnosed As ALS

Did Lou Gehrig really have Lou Gehrig's Disease? The causes of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) are still unknown, but researchers now believe Gehrig's motor neuron disease may have been caused by repeated head trauma and concussions.

A new study out of Boston University and the Veterans Administration, published in the Journal of Neuropathology & Experimental Neurology, offers "the first pathological evidence that repetitive head trauma experienced in collision sports might be associated with the development of a motor neuron disease." The same kinds of head trauma have become the signature injury of troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Resulting memory problems may be misdiagnosed as Alzheimer's disease as well.

Alan Schwarz of the New York Times provides a winning overview of the paper and Gehrig's famous battle with the disease, whichever disease it really was.

Which raises the question: If hyperbaric oxygen therapy is proven efficacious in the treatment of traumatic brain injury (TBI), may we then assume it works for ALS, too?

O2.O is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent web guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy.

Weekly Web Roundup: 21 August 2010

Another weekend and another handy wrap-up of the week's hyperbaric oxygen therapy news, and just about the volume we'd expect for late August. Please do send along any items that may have escaped our attention. We're only too happy to serve as a public relations outlet for the right HBOT business and science stories.

PRESS/BUSINESS

Munson Medical Center, Traverse City MI, lands some fine local TV coverage for its new Accelecare center.

ETC Biomedical Systems has received FDA 510k clearance for its O.S.C.A.R. computerized hyperbaric oxygen control system.

PATIENT STORIES

The parent(s) of a 7-year-old boy writes about his "journey out of autism," with the help of HBOT, on the Sasha's Recovery blog.

NEW HBOT CENTERS

Northwest Florida Community Hospital, Chipley FL, has opened a Wound Healing Institute with Innovative Healing Systems. Local television news coverage here.

Schuylkill Medical Center, Pottsville PA, has opened an Advanced Wound Center with Accelecare.

The Center for Wound Care and Hyperbaric Medicine at Tri-City Medical Center, Vista CA, comes to our attention upon being awarded Wound Care Facility of the Year at last month's 7th International Symposium in Irvine CA.

Fauquier Hospital, Warrenton VA, in June opened a wound center. Gotta love that name.

Sierra Nevada Memorial Hospital, Grass Valley CA, last March opened a wound healing center.

Fremont Area Medical Center, Fremont NE, has opened a Center for Wound Healing with Diversified Clinical Services.

O2.O is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent web guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy.

Natural Health: Science, Business, Politics, Law

Probably we're preaching to the choir at the Alliance for Natural Health, an organization "dedicated to promoting sustainable health and freedom of choice in healthcare through good science and good law." Too many drugs pushed by too powerful a medical establishment? Agreed. More wisdom in prescribing diet and exercise? Definitely. A conspiracy against natural health by Big Pharma, the FDA, and the AMA? Meh. Better health through holistic medicine and supplements? Not so fast.

Nutraceuticals are drugs, too, and frighteningly untested and unregulated, most of them, except as "medical foods." Holistic providers of all stripes seem free to practice in America as they see fit and make all sorts of wild claims without much fear of retribution. If it's FDA clearance and Medicare reimbursement they want, then let's see the evidence, fully vetted and given due process. Heck, the California Walnut Commission did it, and got the FDA to agree that "eating 1.5 oz of walnuts per day, as part of a low saturated fat and low cholesterol diet, and not resulting in increased caloric intake, may reduce the risk of coronary heart disease."

Before reading our reply to the ANH, below, please leave this post and read the organization's "Memo to Political Leaders: When You Think Job Creation, Think Natural Health (If You Don't, Other Countries Will)."

Our reply:

Yes, let’s do embrace natural and ancient remedies and holistic approaches to health and healing. But let’s not pretend Western medicine isn’t on to something BIG with its pesky Scientific Method and evidence-based practice. Call it Conventional if you want. I call it Modern. Sometimes it pretends it knows more than it knows, and like Freedom it requires our constant struggle, yet it’s one of the marvels of our Age. And it should include more alternative thinking for sure.

As for hyperbaric oxygen therapy, the US leads the world, business is brisk, and growth is steady and strong. Thank goodness we have a medical establishment and government regulation to make sure we don’t jump willy-nilly into treatments for which there is no assurance of safety and efficacy. These are pretty low bars for entry.

On my site, HyperbaricLink, you’ll find us championing FDA approval of HBOT indications like traumatic brain injury and stroke, where we find the evidence especially compelling. Where the evidence is scant or merely interesting, we urge investigators to do the clinical trials and publish the findings or shut up.

Our comment is awaiting moderation.

O_2.0 is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy treatment centers, physicians and clinicians, diseases and conditions.

Mitochondrial Disease: Expert Unenthusiastic About HBOT

In a truly informative teleconference sponsored by MitoAction on Friday 6 August, the Cleveland Clinic's Bruce Cohen, MD, professed his knowledge and passion for mitochondrial physiology but cast a vote of no confidence for hyperbaric oxygen therapy. Dr Cohen (photo right) illuminated his skepticism with a fine basic explanation of how the amazing organelle, the powerhouse of our body's cells, normally works and sometimes malfunctions. He also included a helpful discussion of the scientific method and the clinical trial process.

Cohen doesn't put much stock in case reports and makes no apology for not being able to explain the anecdotal successes his listeners shared, with considerable emotion. From his personal experience, he mentioned witnessing the unfortunate death of a child receiving HBOT and his own successful management of Crohn's disease with an unproven diet regimen. He also insisted that he's open to being proven wrong about the efficacy of hyperbaric oxygen therapy for mitochondrial disease.

But the burden for producing first-class evidence for HBOT, he maintains, lies with the hyperbaric medical community. We quite agree. He points to the ongoing cerebral palsy trial at the Children's Medical Center of Dayton as exemplary. Cohen's ideal randomized controlled trial for mitochondrial disease would be a crossover study of 20 patients with confirmed genetic disease, with 10 patients receiving HBOT and 10 receiving sham therapy to start, then switching the groups midway through the trial.

Sounds good to us. Let's get on it!

CLICK HERE to access an audio recording of the call, complete with illustrative slides, a lively Q&A session, and postpresentation discussion with patients and families.

Dr Cohen was also on the panel of the Mitochondria and Autism Symposium co-sponsored by the United Mitochondrial Disease Foundation and Autism Speaks. The panel reports that 5%-10% of patients with autism may also have a likely mitochondrial dysfunction. Not much enthusiasm for HBOT among these experts, either.

CLICK HERE to read the official Autism Speaks blogpost on the symposium.

O_2.0 is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy treatment centers, physicians and clinicians, diseases and conditions.

Online Patient Communities: Get Your HBOT On

We're noticing more patients sharing their hyperbaric oxygen therapy experiences online, and again we urge our readers and HyperbaricLink visitors to join the revolution already in progress. Offhand, we can't think of a better way, short of participating in a randomized clinical trial, for you to help yourself, help other patients, and help advance hyperbaric medicine.

PatientsLikeMe still earns our loyal fandom and high marks for data richness, substance, and openness. The site's "Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy HBOT Treatment Report" now includes 9 patient evaluations. A start. These 9 patients have undergone HBOT for 12 different reasons, with self-reported efficacy ranging from "none" to "major."

Let's say you're not into sharing your outcomes, but chatting with other patients like you sounds appealing. Try MDJunction. We eavesdropped on a hyperbaric treatment string in the fibromyalgia support group, and elsewhere on the site you'll find snippets of conversation on other HBOT-related topics that may interest you.

Please comment below about your experience with PatientsLikeMe and MDJunction. Where else on the World Wide Web are HBOT patients talking it up? We want to know.

O2.o is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent web guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy.

TBI: Should HBOT Be Limited To Clinical Trials?

Occasionally a news reporter surprises us by actually doing her job and doing the hard work of journalism. Take a lesson from Palm Beach Post staff writer Lona O'Connor, who takes the time and effort to help us understand the people, facts, and points-of-view in last week's story: "Therapist using hyperbaric chamber to help Iraq/Afghan vets cope with brain disorder."

Most reporters would have run with the publicity feed and focused exclusively on the injured vets. This story manages to take in all the human drama of their story, while questioning the wisdom of seeking pro bono treatment by a physical therapist, without disrespecting the vets or the physical therapist. She also interviews (1) a local traumatic brain injury expert, who rightly drains some of the feel-good out of the piece by citing the current evidence, and (2) a VA physician, who speaks for the clinical trials now under way. Money quote:

There are many human conditions we don't have the answers for. You don't help people just because you feel bad for them. You have to do something that's safe but isn't going to make them worse. And if something bad happens, what's he going to fall back on?

The article also introduces us to another HBOT center, Crallé Physical Therapy and Oxygen Rescue Care Centers of America (ORCCA), Delray Beach FL. Our best wishes for them and their selfless work. Still, like the VA doc quoted above, we'd much rather see these brave patients in the hands of board-certified physicians conducting peer-reviewed clinical investigations in collaboration with a military or academic medical center.

(Photo credit: Richard Graulich, Palm Beach Post)

O2.o is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent web guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy.

Improving HBOT's Signal-To-Noise Ratio (Once More)

Meet Hustlebot, "Pittsburgh's Best Comedy Troupe," and this week's #1 time suck for one innocent blogger on the search for fresh hyperbaric news for youse. Funny stuff. Unless you'd rather be "earning a living, or eating meals, or caring for your children." (Thanks, Urban Dictionary!)

If we were just another army of Twitter robots, and if they keep nicknaming themselves "Hbot," Hustlebot might someday dominate our tweets and retweets. Good thing our humans click through then read and think about every item before posting the story.

Oh, no! Did we just waste your time talking about a waste of time? Last time, we almost promise. Quick, go catch up on this week's real hyperbaric news with our Weekly Web Roundup. Handcrafted in small batches for your efficient reading pleasure.

O2.o is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent web guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy, at www.hyperbariclink.com

Weekly Web Roundup: 14 August 2010

Join us here every weekend for a HyperbaricLink selection of HBOT news from around the web. Looking for something in particular? Use the tool in the upper left corner to search this blog. Missing a story you think we should have caught? Add your comment to the end of this post, or CLICK HERE to contact us with news, information, or ideas.

PRESS/BUSINESS

Oil industry expert Matthew Simmons, in a posthumous interview, speaks to The Maritime Executive about the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster and the role hyperbaric chambers played in the early days of offshore drilling.

Environmental Tectonics Corp, Southampton PA, takes steps to recover from financial difficulties with a buyback of Series E preferred shares and a key sale to a medical supplier in Hanoi, Vietnam.

A 33-year-old EMT in Texas died of carbon monoxide from a generator running in an ambulance parked in the station bay. The building didn't have a CO detector. Two colleagues were treated with hyperbaric oxygen and remain hospitalized.

Celebrity gossip factory TMZ and reps for Tim Tebow totally busted Pikes Peak Hyperbaric, Colorado Springs and Denver CO, for embellishing its story and doctoring photos of the mHBOT bag it's renting to the Denver Broncos QB sensation. Photoshop FAIL.

PATIENT STORIES

Sport Rider magazine goes into some depth covering motorcycle racer Randy De Puniet's swift recovery from a double leg fracture with the aid of hyperbaric oxygen therapy in Marseilles, France.

A cancer survivor and young wife and mother of two journals about her HBOT experience at Hennepin County Medical Center, Minneapolis MN, in the "This Is What It Means To Be Held, What It Means To Be Loved" blog.

NEW HBOT CENTERS

We learn of Portneuf Wound Care and Hyperbaric Center, Pocatello ID, with its announcement of new medical director Dr Julio Vasquez.

The Advanced Wound Healing Center at McKenzie-Willamette Medical Center, Springfield OR, opened December 2009 and just now catches our readership with the story of limb salvage for a 71-year-old man with a diabetic foot ulcer.

The Wound Care Institute at St Francis Hospital & Health Centers, headquartered in Indianapolis IN, apparently has a Mooresville location to add to our Beech Grove listing. Operations will be centralized at the system's new Indianapolis campus patient tower, scheduled to open in March 2011.

Healdsburg District Hospital, Healdsburg, Sonoma County CA, ballyhoos its new Northern California Wound Care center with an excellent HBOT primer and photo story in The Press Democrat.

Spokane Hyperbaric Center, Spokane WA, comes crashing to our attention with this over-the-top 30-second TV spot:



O2.o is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent web guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy, at www.hyperbariclink.com

Are Osteopathic Physicians Real Doctors?

Yes, when you see DO after a doctor's name, rest assured he or she has received a bona fide medical education and is fully licensed to prescribe drugs and practice medicine in any number of specialties, including hyperbaric medicine. Wednesday we noticed that UHMS president-elect John Feldmeier is an osteopathic physician, one quite warmly accepted and honored by his allopathic colleagues. (You hardly ever hear the word "allopath," but that's a proper term for a doctor awarded the MD degree.)

Perhaps because of their additional musculoskeletal training and hands-on manipulation, DOs often get lumped in with chiropractors. And because of their whole-person approach to medicine, they're often confused for other (let's say lesser) holistic practitioners.

As Dr Thomas Bozzuto, DO, of Phoebe Wound Care and Hyperbaric Center (Albany GA) recently told the Albany Herald, “I like to say my education in osteopathic medicine taught me to take care of the patient as a whole, rather than take care of the hole in the patient." What a great line.

Having worked with many DOs and directly with the American Osteopathic Association, we also know that osteopaths have demonstrated a longstanding commitment to preventive care and to reaching underserved populations in America's inner cities and rural communities. Bravo!

Allopathic, osteopathic, chiropractic, holistic—you'll find fine providers in all these categories. We won't defend them all here. But we can report with confidence that, when it comes to choosing a hyperbaric physician, DOs are not Don'ts.

Visit the AOA website for more information and news about osteopathic medicine today.

O2.o is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent web guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy, at www.hyperbariclink.com

A Model For Hyperbaric Referral Instructions

How delighted we'd be if every ProfilePlus page in the HyperbaricLink treatment center directory were linked to such clear and complete information for referring physicians as Virginia Mason Medical Center (Seattle WA) provides on its website. The center's updated Emergency Hyperbaric Referral Instructions page, strictly covering carbon monoxide poisoning, decompression sickness, and arterial gas embolism, neatly summarizes:

• Definitions/Causes
• Diagnosis/Symptoms
• Indications for hyperbaric treatment
• EMS management guidelines
• Patient information to capture

We think this simple format is a model of its kind. But why limit such helpful information to emergency indications? Referring physicians might benefit even more from expert guidance on chronic diseases and conditions.

O2.o is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent web guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy, at www.hyperbariclink.com

UHMS President-Elect Underscores Radiation Risks

John Feldmeier, DO, is the only US physician who is board certified in both hyperbaric medicine and radiation oncology. He was elected by the Undersea & Hyperbaric Medical Society in June to an eight-year term on the Board of Directors, serving two years as president-elect, two as president, two as immediate past president, and two as past president.

Feldmeier's election underscores the growing role of hyperbaric medicine in the treatment of delayed radiation injuries in cancer patients. Most cancer and wound care specialists agree the risks and injuries demand careful study and swift action, as we've been following with great interest in the New York Times series, "The Radiation Boom."

Currently a professor and for 12 years chair of the University of Toledo department of radiation oncology, Feldmeier brings to the UHMS a wealth of experience as former chief of radiation oncology at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio, and Grace-Sinai Hospital in Detroit. Read the full UT press release HERE.

We're especially excited about Dr Feldmeier's commitment to collaborative, cross-institutional hyperbaric research.

Our congratulations and best wishes.

See The Little Pufferbellies All In A Row

Last month we got our first closeup look at some inflatable/portable chambers cheerfully hissing away near our stand at the HBOT2010 7th International Symposium. There we met the most wonderful folks—patients, clinicians, and businesspeople—whose zeal impressed but whose words and ideas left us with troubling questions about the validity—science, equipment, and promotion—of mild hyperbaric oxygen therapy today.

Still we're confident there's a place in the world for mHBOT. It lies somewhere between this week's hatchet job in the Canadian Press and this local TV puff piece:



We're apt to agree when "MDs want rules for private hyperbaric clinics promoting unproven treatments." In fact there are rules Health Canada and the US Food and Drug Administration can and do enforce from time to time. But that's a totally unfair matchup of interviewees in the Canadian Press article.

We're apt to support good people offering sick children and families hope and no-cost access to therapy. But their claims are as wild as their HBOT is mild. And that's full media complicity in violative promotions by My Fox Tampa Bay.

HyperbaricLink prefers a shakeup to a crackdown. More information for healthcare consumers and referring physicians. More facility accreditation and professional credentialing. More clinical investigations and evidence-based practice. More light and less heat in our struggle to advance hyperbaric medicine, even HBOT of the mild persuasion, between consenting adults, and preferably under a doctor's supervision in a safety-inspected clinical setting that can handle any possible side-effects or medical emergencies.

Autism: Second CARD Study Finds HBOT Ineffective

A new study, supplementing last year's work by the same Center for Autism & Related Disorders (CARD) team, casts yet more doubt on the efficacy of mild hyperbaric oxygen therapy (mHBOT) for children with autism. The original paper is forthcoming in Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, the leading peer-reviewed, scholarly periodical on autism spectrum disorders.

These investigations are of a lower order than the Rossignol random controlled trial, where the efficacy of mHBOT was demonstrated. But still we consider CARD's null findings and well-played refutation an even more important contribution to the medical literature today.

We're also aware of the sometimes combative passions within the autism community, even among normally dispassionate scientists, and especially surrounding the Defeat Autism Now! (DAN!) movement. Rossignol excites us, too. Yet it disturbs us whenever we hear mHBOT practitioners ready to take Rossignol to the clinic, to the home, or (ahem) to the bank. We've seen him present and heard him emphasize just how much more work there is to be done.

In the final analysis, none of the studies published to date could charitably be called landmark science. We're very early in this important pursuit, and we encourage investigators to take stock and look ahead. Again we draw the reader's attention to the nicely balanced UHMS position statement on "The Treatment of Autism Spectrum Disorder with Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy." (See our June 16 post, HBOT For Autism: Junk Science?)

Weekly Web Roundup: 8 August 2010

Keep tuning in to HyperbaricLink every weekend for tastefully selected headlines, even after such a slow hyperbaric news week as this.

PRESS/BUSINESS

Winnie Joanne Barefoot has been indicted by a federal grand jury on seven counts of bank, wire, mail, and Social Security fraud and ordered held by a judge of the US District Court in Baltimore. Barefoot owns Advanced Hyperbarics, which operates treatment centers in Millersville MD, Orlando FL, Jacksonville FL, and Bedford PA.

New Orleans Saints tight end Billy Miller, who owns the Elite Performance Factory in Westlake Village CA, spotlights hyperbaric therapy in his preseason publicity.

SCIENCE

Hepatitis-Central.com asks, "Is Hyperbaric Oxygen a Viable Therapy for Hepatitis C?" The author finds no direct evidence but cites (1) a Russian study that showed improved postoperative liver function in animals with chronic toxic hepatitis and (2) an ongoing University of Edinburgh study of HBOT in the treatment of alcoholic liver disease.

Investigators from the University of Nevada School of Medicine, studying rats and publishing in Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, determine the nitric oxide mechanism by which hyperbaric oxygen inhibits ischemic reperfusion injury.

PATIENT STORIES

Firefighters in Oregon City OR rescued five mobile home residents and evacuated three to Providence Medical Center for hyperbaric oxygen treatment for smoke inhalation and carbon monoxide poisoning.

NEW HBOT CENTERS

Light publicity acquaints us with Harrington Hospital, Southbridge MA, operating a wound care center in partnership with Diversified Clinical Services.

FL Lobster Mini Season Tests Alert Network

Every July the event draws scores of amateur "bug" hunters and recreational divers to the southern Florida coast. That spells trouble for emergency first responders and the regional Divers Alert Network. St Mary's Medical Center, West Palm Beach, is one of the hyperbaric chambers that stands ready. Sure enough, the center's advance planning paid off big for one 40-year-old man suffering the bends, as US Coast Guard commanding officer David Ladomirak recounts in another video.

The Big Reboot (Reprise)

We've just postdated another overdue Weekly Web Roundup for 1 August 2010. Scroll down or click here to catch up on last week's hyperbaric oxygen therapy news from around the web.

Dog Diagnoses, Treats Diabetic Foot Ulcer

Infection control and limb salvage with hyperbaric oxygen therapy is just one of several modern (and strongly preferable) alternatives to this home remedy.

The Big Reboot

Quite frankly, that 7th International Symposium threw us for a loop, and at long last we're finishing up laptop repairs and restarting our brisk correspondence and faithful reportage. Thank you for your patience and readership.

Find our first overdue Weekly Web Roundup HERE postdated 25 July 2010 for archival neatness and completeness. More news soon to follow. Onward!

Weekly Web Roundup: 1 August 2010

So much noise and so little news worth your valuable time online, so every weekend the HyperbaricLink blog sifts it through and distills it down to the top hyperbaric medicine headlines.

SCIENCE

Studying the treatment of acute necrotizing pancreatitis in rats, researchers from Beijing, China, publishing in Canadian Journal of Surgery, conclude that hyperbaric oxygen combined with ulinastatin was more effective than either therapy alone.

A Medscape case study, "The Not-So-Acute Abdomen," includes a discussion of the advantages of hyperbaric oxygen in treating a 72-year-old man with abdominal pain diagnosed as pneumatosis cystoides intestinalis.

Brazilian surgeons investigating suture strength in colon repair for perotinis in rats, published in Acta Cirurgica Brasiliera, found no benefits with hyperbaric oxygen therapy.

PRESS/BUSINESS

Hyperbaric for Life LLC (Phoenix AZ) received an FDA warning letter regarding violations in its manufacture of hyperbaric chamber Class III medical devices.

Tyco Valves and Controls (Schaffhausen, Switzerland) has invested in two hyperbaric chambers to test subsea equipment in simulated environments as deep as 3,000 m (9,842 ft).

Environmental Tectonics Corp (Southampton PA) has added former astronaut Winston Scott to its board of directors.

PATIENT STORIES

A woman bears witness to her "third go-round with cancer," including hyperbaric oxygen for delayed radiation injury, in the Breathing In Hope blog.

Mexican boxer Juan Manuel Marquez works hyperbarics into his training routine and wins his Saturday night bout against Juan "Baby Bull" Diaz by unanimous decision.

A father blogs about his newborn son's recovery from brain injury suffered during birth and their recent commencement of HBOT sessions.

Denver Broncos QB and Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow uses HBOT in his grueling workout routine.

A woman blogs about her fight with endometrial cancer and HBOT treatment for delayed radiation injury.

NEW HBOT CENTERS

FirstHealth Richmond Memorial Hospital (Rockingham NC) grabs our attention with a 67-year-old woman's story of diabetic foot ulcers and limb salvage at its Wound Care and Hyperbaric Center. FirstHealth of the Carolinas also operates a wound center at its flagship Moore Regional Hospital (Pinehurst NC).

We learn of NJ-based Saint Barnabus Health Care System's wound centers at Clara Maass, Kimball, Monmouth, Beth Israel Newark, and Saint Barnabus with publicity surrounding the visit of congressman Rodney Frelinghuysen.