HBOT Operational At The Tiger Woods Mansion

Okay, we're feeling a little icky about relaying this tabloid dreck (again!), and we really can't explain why it's in the news (again!), so we've backdated it 48 hours. Let's hope beyond hope we never again stub our toe on a line like: "He has a Michael Jackson hyperbaric chamber."

Now please accept these links as a hyperbaric reminder that, when it comes to HBOT, all your average man and woman on the street knows is Jacko and maybe the local football star slept in one. And when it comes to improving HBOT awareness and education, we've all got our work cut out for us—and miles to go before we sleep, and miles to go before we sleep.

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

HBOT Attracting More And More NFL Players

So it took us a few extra weeks to get into this football season, after the first signs of a change in the weather and the first Michigan victory—or maybe it's all this talk about hyperbaric oxygen therapy. HBOT has been blitzing the sports blogosphere. It's rather predictable and pedestrian stuff over at Skinny Post. All the usual suspects. But the Washington Post's Dan Steinberg raises some interesting questions about players' differing "beliefs" in HBOT for speedier rehab from injury and, more surprising, their worries that hyperbaric oxygen may suddenly be banned like other performance enhancing drugs. We've often wondered the same.

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

HBOT For Bone Fracture: Fundamental Mechanisms

Out of Taiwan comes a new study with new insights into precisely how hyperbaric oxygen helps fractured bones heal. Scientists observed in vitro cultures of specialized bone-producing cells, called osteoblasts, under normal conditions and with hyperbaric oxygen. They found that "the proliferative effects of hyperbaric [oxygen] on osteoblasts may contribute to the recruitment of osteoblasts at the fracture site."

HBOT has long been used to treat broken bones associated with crush injuries, compartment syndrome, and other traumatic ischemias. Many hyperbaric physicians and patients claim HBOT accelerates the healing process. This primary research may support such claims by describing how hyperbaric oxygen stimulates the fundamental mechanisms of bone production.

A quick Google Scholar search shows nearly 7,000 articles on "hyperbaric AND fracture." Surely the next 7,000 will cite this study. And so will we, in a Bone Fractures page, coming soon to the HyperbaricLink Diseases and Conditions section.

Aussie Cricketer Dominates Holiday HBOT News

All through December about the only thing our usual newsfeeds wanted to know was, Will the Australian cricket skipper Ricky Ponting be healthy for the Boxing Day Test? To speed healing of a strained tendon in his elbow Ponting spent the night of his 35th birthday in a hyperbaric chamber. Seems to have worked. Yes, he played December 26, and played brilliantly, by all reliable accounts.

So we add another high-profile testimonial to a growing list of elite athletes using and promoting hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT). And it's not just a fad. More and more professional athletes, trainers, and sports medicine professionals are choosing HBOT as an alternative or adjunctive treatment for sports injury rehabilitation. Even if claims of speedier healing don't find much support in the clinical literature, there's no stopping a trend this strong.

We're fascinated by the growing popularity of HBOT for sports rehabilitation. But could hyperbaric oxygen be considered a kind of performance-enhancing drug, like blood doping? Does room air at mild pressure (mHBOT) do any good? What dosages of pressure and oxygen work best for various types and severities of injury?

In time, today's active practitioners will find the answers in the clinic and spread the word among their peers. We're on the beat and on the side of healthcare consumers seeking useful information and easy connections to local clinics and physicians.