Banner Boswell Medical Center in Sun City, Arizona, Adds Third Hyperbaric Chamber

The growing hyperbaric oxygen therapy center at Boswell Banner Medical Center in Sun City, Arizona, helped this man with bladder spasms caused by delayed radiation injury and caught the attention of this local TV health reporter. The center will host a community open house to show off its new chamber 8a to 11a on Wednesday 16 May.

Lee Memorial Hospital: Local Plug for Fort Myers, Florida, Wound Care Center a Model of Brevity, Clarity

Sometimes just a bit of just the right information communicates best. Hats off to Lee Memorial Hospital in Fort Myers, Florida, for landing the kind of local coverage every hyperbaric oxygen treatment center should covet. This little gem from the local NBC affiliate hits all the basics with minimum effort:

• A stirring tale of a 2-year-old girl recovering from burns.
• A short explanation of what wound centers do and how hyperbaric oxygen therapy works.
• A strong case for adapting to meet the public healthcare demands of a rapidly aging population.
• A believable connection to success with advanced, specialized wound care centers.

No doubt the hospital marketing and public relations team and clinical experts played this one clear and straight. That's why this reporter got a great story, this hospital got some great ink, and these readers got another great reason to look into this great new movement in American medicine. All in about 390 words.

[Photo: Lee Memorial Hospital website]

Hyperbaric Oxygen Treatment for Radiation Injury: Important New Clinical Evidence Published in Cancer

The use of hyperbaric oxygen for delayed soft tissue radionecrosis (STRI) and osteoradionecrosis (bony necrosis) just got another healthy dose of first-rate clinical evidence. For eight years investigators, led by Neil Hampson and UHMS president-elect John Feldmeier, tracked outcomes in patients receiving hyperbaric oxygen treatment for radiation injury after cancer therapy at Virginia Mason Medical Center in Seattle, Washington. They noted significantly positive results in patients with injuries of the jaw, skin, larynx, bladder, and bowel. Read "Prospective assessment of outcomes in 411 patients treated with hyperbaric oxygen for chronic radiation tissue injury" in the journal Cancer [DOI: 10.1002/cncr.26637]. Or there's an excellent summary on MedWire News.

Hyperbaric Oxygen Treatment Centers: Advantages of Participating in the HyperbaricLink Directory

Let's pick one center at random from today's newsfeed. Almost precisely one year ago, we wrote with enthusiasm about the expansion of the hyperbaric wound care program at Oakwood Heritage Hospital, in your faithful correspondent's idyllic hometown of Taylor, Michigan. We immediately gathered what information was available and posted standard profile MI019 in the HyperbaricLink treatment center directory. Take a quick look and come right back.

What's missing? An email address to contact. The name of a medical director or administrator. What else? Without the benefit of any communication with the center, we simply don't know.

Now go read about the center on the hospital's website. About advanced wound care and hyperbaric oxygen therapy the hospital provides very little information for patients, families, and referring physicians. But here we do learn what conditions this center treats: chronic wounds, diabetic ulcers, skin grafts and flaps, osteomyelitis, and radionecrosis. That's three more than we listed. Had this center worked with us to publish a complete and accurate listing, HyperbaricLink visitors would get all the right information, complete with links to our trustworthy content on HBOT, diseases and conditions treated, the published clinical evidence, and plenty of helpful, reliable resources.

What other advantages might Oakwood Heritage gain by participating with HyperbaricLink? Try googling wound care taylor mi. Your local search results will differ from ours, but likely you'll find our directory listing equals or beats the hospital. List with us, link to us, and we all secure the top spots for the most relevant queries. About this subject we have dedicated an entire page, where you can also request our white paper on Internet Best Practices for Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy Providers.

ATTENTION Treatment Centers. Start your countdown to a complete and accurate listing in our directory. It's as easy as 3-2-1. See what's new and create the profile that's right for your facility.

CLICK HERE to learn more about directory listing options.  

Only by working together can we make the evidence-based hyperbaric community more prominent and more discoverable on the web. And don't worry, Oakwood. We'll be in touch.

[Photo: Oakwood Healthcare website]

West Virginia Hyperbaric Wound Care Center Lands Choice Promo on Local TV Healthbeat

Here's a 4-minute clinic in how to promote your hyperbaric wound care center. Click here to watch medical director Rolando Cunanan, MD, clearly and soberly explain how he and his team heal with hyperbaric oxygen therapy at United Hospital Center (UHC) in Bridgeport, West Virginia. For a local TV news spot, with a junior healthbeat anchor, this is about as good as it gets.

[Photo: Video capture, WDTV.com]

Toppers: Our 10 Most Popular Stories of 2011

As the year quickly draws to a close, we're thankful for our loyal readers, and for new ones every day. We will work hard to keep bringing you evidence-based hyperbaric oxygen therapy news in the year ahead. Sometimes we hit on a topic, share a video, or link to a story that really strikes a chord. Here's a list of our most popular stories of 2011, in descending order, according to Blogger.

Arthritis: Gout Awareness Day

TBI: Concussion Tests Doing More Harm Than Good?

Should Your Hyperbaric Physician Be Board Certified?

Gingrich Slips HBOT into the Obamacare News Cycle

Hello, Cleveland: HBOT Gets the Plain Deal

HBOT for Radiation Injury of No Use in Nuclear Disaster

National Healing and Diversified to Merge

College Football: New Data on Concussion by Position

Restorix Health Mixes It Up in Greater Seattle

Pioneering Frogman Invented, Named SCUBA

Cheers and best wishes for the New Year.

Cancer: Hyperbaric Oxygen and Tumor Growth

A complicated question has been on our minds ever since we updated our radionecrosis (delayed radiation injury) page. Does HBOT promote tumor growth or cancer recurrence? From our friends at The Wound Healer blog we get an informed answer. "Hyperbaric Oxygen and Cancer Fears" explains that

... tumor growth occurs regardless of oxygen status. In fact, tumor cells that grow and survive in the hypoxic regions of the tumor are more aggressive, more prone to metastasis, and more resistant to treatment.

More exciting, hyperbaric oxygenation may make tumor cells more susceptible to traditional cancer therapies, especially radiation.

We welcome this new information, complete with footnotes, in followup to our August 4 post, "Cancer: HBOT Combined with Radiation, Chemo." Clearly there's much more for us to read and learn about this fascinating topic.

Brain Cancer: HBOT Combined with Radiation, Chemo

Most every FDA-cleared and UHMS-approved indication for hyperbaric oxygen involves its use as an adjunct, or supplement, to other standard therapies. Yet medical science is just now beginning important research into the potentially harmful and beneficial effects of hyperbaric oxygen in combination with common therapeutics. (See our July 21 post, "Mixing Hyperbaric Oxygen With Other Prescription Drugs.") New studies are exploring the use of HBOT with radio- and chemotherapy in the treatment of malignant glioblastoma, or glioma, the most aggressive form of brain cancer.

Investigators want to know if increasing the oxygen concentration in the tumor might lend standard therapies a boost. Early results show promise. Phase II of a long-term clinical trial in Japan, published March 17 in the International Journal of Radiation Oncology • Biology • Physics, concludes:

Radiotherapy delivered immediately after HBO with multiagent chemotherapy was safe, with virtually no late toxicities, and seemed to be effective in patients with high-grade gliomas.

Previous studies out of Japan showed similar benefit. Another Phase II study, the first in the US, at the Long Island Brain Tumor Center in Great Neck and Commack, New York, is currently recruiting participants. Learn more about enrolling on ClinicalTrials.gov and read more about this important work in Medical News Today.

O2.0 is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent web guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy.

Update: HBOT For Radionecrosis (Delayed Radiation Injury)

Today we have upgraded our Radionecrosis page. It's a most fitting way to begin updating our section on the Approved indications for hyperbaric oxygen, as delayed radiation injury ranks among the most well researched and common uses of HBOT. In our HyperbaricLink Commentary we also note:

Medical science offers few other options for cancer patients who suffer delayed radiation injuries. As more oncologists employ more powerful and sophisticated radiation therapy technologies, more patients will be healed. And more will be hurt. So the lack of access to accredited hyperbaric facilities and certified hyperbaric physicians and technicians is a growing public health problem.

Just yesterday, on MDNews.com, Dr. Felix A. Pesa wrote, "To date HBOT is the only therapy that reverses the effects of radiation induced tissue damage." Pesa is medical director of Humility of Mary Health Partners Wound Care and Hyperbaric Medicine at St. Elizabeth in Youngstown and St. Joseph in Warren, Ohio.

People affected by radiation injury will find new links to relevant cancer community and support groups under Patient Resources. We now refer visitors directly to the ACHM's Radiation Research Registry (RRR) and the Baromedical Research Foundation's Hyperbaric Oxygen Radiation Tissue Injury Study (HORTIS) pages for more complete information about current research. Find these and other new links under Clinical Resources.

See our June 7 post, "Diseases/Conditions Upgrades And Updates," for more information about our new page format. And look for regular updates in the days and weeks ahead.

[Image: Interactive graphic "Fatal Radiation" by Graham Roberts/Bill Marsh, New York Times.]

O2.0 is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent web guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy.

HBOT For Radiation Injury Of No Use In Nuclear Disaster

Lest there be any confusion or spurious claims, let's remember: the demonstrated effectiveness of hyperbaric oxygen in treating delayed radiation injury is strictly limited to treating tissue damage caused by cancer therapy. HBOT is of no use to medical personnel caring today for the victims of acute radiation syndrome (ARS) in the communities surrounding the Fukushima and other nuclear power facilities in Japan.

Please join us in supporting the relief efforts of the American Red Cross. Text REDCROSS to 90999 to donate $10.

O2.0 is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent web guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy.
 

Gingrich Slips HBOT Into The Obamacare News Cycle

Newt Gingrich spent most of his time slamming healthcare reform legislation and the State of the Union address, but he and South Florida television viewers also learned a thing or two about HBOT during his tour of the Hyperbaric Medicine and Wound Care Program at Bethesda Memorial Hospital (Boynton Beach FL) today.

Visiting a cancer survivor undergoing HBOT for radiation injury, the former Speaker of the House praised the hospital's clinical innovation as well as its business savvy in partnering with National Healing to establish the program 15 years ago:

[Hyperbaric oxygen therapy] is rapidly becoming the standard of care to avoid amputations and improve quality of life. Centralized bureaucracies cannot get us into the future as quickly as local partnerships can.

Click the arrow to watch the video below. Read more about Gingrich's visit in the Palm Beach Post.



O2.0 is the news blog of HyperbaricLink, the independent web guide to hyperbaric oxygen therapy.

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.

Share Your Radiation Therapy Story With The Times

In today's New York Times, Tara Parker-Pope's Well blog asks readers for stories about radiation therapy for cancer, including experiences with delayed radiation injury. Already one reader (Larry, comment #8) gives a moving HBOT testimonial. Your faithful correspondent's knocking on the door, too, with a link to O2.0's June 16 post on the reimbursement fight for radionecrosis.

Radionecrosis: Fighting For RRReimbursement

So often healthcare's more about the pittance than about the patient. The medical literature and UHMS and Medicare support the use of hyperbaric oxygen to treat delayed radiation injury. Yet some major insurers have taken to categorizing HBOT as "experimental-investigational" and denying coverage. Well, the hyperbaric medicine community is fighting back. The American College of Hyperbaric Medicine's Radiation Research Registry