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Stressed Out Students SOS

Wednesday Jul 22, 2015

Wednesday Jul 22, 2015

College students are stressed out.  Listen to this message about why and what is being done about it.S.O.S.
Stressed Out
Students Before young people
join us in the adult work and family responsibility world they are already
experiencing the effects of stress from the academic world.  College life is not a full time party for all
students.  There is a lot of pressure to
study, hand in assignments on time, and perform well on exams.  Students and or their parents usually have a
huge financial investment which is at risk if they don’t do well.  Most also have the stress of looking forward
to graduating with a large amount of student loan debt.  They are also already worrying about the
challenge of competing with the masses to find a job after graduation.
According to a May
27, 2015 New York Times article anxiety is the most common mental health
problem of college students.  A study by
the Center for Collegiate Mental Health at Penn State revealed that more than
half of 100,000 students indicate that anxiety is a health concern for
them.  A survey by the American College
Health Association showed that more than 16 percent of college students have
been diagnosed with or treated for anxiety within the last year.  These are numbers of people who actually seek
help.  Usually with mental health issues
including anxiety many people do not seek help. 
Considering this, the problem is even greater.   Many colleges and
universities have counseling centers to help students with problems like
anxiety and depression.  Some of them are
beginning to reach or surpass their capacity. 
 Counseling centers
offer individual and group therapy, mindfulness training, stress kits including
things like stress balls that you squeeze as a way to relieve stress, and pet
therapy.  Some also offer biofeedback which
uses technology to measure things like muscle tension, heart rate, breathing,
sweat, and brainwave activity. 
Biofeedback shows a person the levels of these signals so that they can
become more aware of the changes and learn how to regulate them by the power of
their own mind.  This gives them a sense
of control which is key in reducing anxiety. 
If you feel that you have no control in a situation you feel more
anxious.  When you feel like you have
some control in a situation it helps to reduce anxiety.   Students need to have stress management
assistance made available to them to help them to maintain or regain their
mental health as well as perform at their best in their studies. 
For a free stress
card and other free information on stress management text STRESS to 55469
Harry L. CampbellPresident,
Biofeedback Resources International
www.biofeedbackinternational.com
Author of the book
“What Stress Can Do”
www.createspace.com/3839220
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/BiofeedbackResources
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Biofeedback-Resources-International-Corp/118594803123
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Tuesday Jun 25, 2013












Bio and Neurofeedback Protocols for the Treatment of Chronic Pain




Chronic Pain

Every day is more frequent to hear the expression: “I suffer from a chronic pain syndrome” or maybe “I’m a chronic pain sufferer” or “I’ve been suffering this pain for long time”. But ¿What is chronic pain? ¿Which are the differences between chronic and acute pain? In fact: ¿What is pain?
Neuroscientists and physicians agree that pain is a subjective experience in perception, a natural neurophysiological response to injury or illness and a basic process of alarm that tell us something is going wrong with our health.


Acute pain has a sudden onset and resolution –within hours, days or weeks- it is attributable to an event: injury or illness. Responds to appropriate treatment and, in some cases, has episodes associated with some conditions: like migraine or dysmenorrhea.

But chronic pain is a very different health issue. First of all, it is a maladaptive response; it’s persistent commonly defined within 3-6 months of duration. But what is most important: is difficult to treat –improvement possible and cure often elusive- and interferes with activities of daily life –work, school, social events and chores-. Several common sources of chronic pain have been identified: migraine, and other serious headaches –there have been described 150 different headaches types since 1980-, arthritis and other joint pain, fibromyalgia, irritable bowel syndrome, chronic interstitial cystitis, trauma and post-surgical pain, low back pain, cancer, stroke, diabetes just to mention some of the most common.

And ¿what is pain by the numbers? ¿What is the epidemiology of pain?


According to the Institute of Medicine Report of 2011, 80% of patients experience postoperative pain. From that number 10-50% develops chronic pain. 5% of American women aged between 28-65, experience headaches 15 or more days per month and 62% of nursing home residents report pain.
Approximately 6 million women have fibromyalgia, more than that number have neuropathic pain and 26.4% of Americans, report low back pain lasting at least a day during a 3 months period of time.

The cost of pain is awesome: 116 million U.S. adults have common chronic pain conditions. Because of that number a conservative estimate of the annual cost of chronic pain to federal and state governments in medical expenditures for pain was $99 billion. These estimates exclude: individuals in institutional settings –nursing home residents or correction inmates-, military personnel, children under the age of 18 and personal caregivers. It's also excluded the loss of productivity of workers 65 years and in all the cases: the e motional cost of pain.


The problem of chronic pain is: under-diagnosed and under-treated. Several factors have been described associated to the vulnerability to pain: age group, sex and gender, income an education, military veterans, surgical, cancer and patients at the end of life. For all these reasons it has to be concluded that chronic pain is costly and prevalent. Unfortunately chronic pain is underreported, under-diagnosed and under-treated in nearly all health care settings. Something chronic pain syndromes have in common is how poor the quality of life is to the people suffering from it and the way the physical, mental health and personal economy are permanently compromised. Looking at the numbers, epidemiology prevalence and nature of chronic pain it is to be considered that chronic pain is a disease in itself and requires a comprehensive treatment approach.

The contributions of basic and applied research in Neurosciences for the treatment chronic pain have been substantially improved and refined in recent years. In applied Neurosciences, Biofeedback and Neurofeedback have been used successfully for the treatment of different chronic pain syndromes. Applied research has demonstrated how, if chronic pain is treated by diminishing its psychophysiological components, most of them in the self-regulation spectrum, the physical, cognitive and emotional integration is reduced, as well as the physiological and physical response to the pain itself. Studying the electrophysiological components of the acute and chronic pain response, it has been described that the central and peripheral elements that can be present independently or in a constellation, also known as a pain's physiological profile and that can be permanently changed with therapy. In applied Neurosciences, therapies have been created for both types of components to be treated both: simultaneo usly or separately.

The advance in the field is incredible, professionals interested in the theme not only could start a specialty by acquiring training in Biofeedback or Neurofeedback for the management of chronic pain syndromes in general, but become specialized by defining a specific training in one or both specialties and a specific chronic pain syndrome.

With these ideas in mind, we created a seminar considering the contributions in both fields, the basic and advanced elements of each one and the protocols already proved and replicated for the most common chronic pain syndromes.
In the seminar, participants will be trained to select the proper patients/clients to be treated with the Biofeedback and Neurofeedback protocols depending on a specific chronic pain syndrome. Participants will develop the proper skills for the operation of the Bio and Neurofeedback systems for the treatment of the chronic pain syndromes, to conduct the intervention and the proper treatment and follow up protocols.

Themes like: neurophysiology and psychophysiology of chronic pain, the QEEG and psychophysiological profiles of chronic pain patients, and the neurophysiological markers in acute and chronic pain will be reviewed.
We will emphasize themes like: EEG during sleep, consciousness and endogenous evoked potentials in chronic pain syndromes.

Other themes considered in this seminar are: the psychophysiology of pain, the ANS response in acute and chronic pain, the limbic system response during chronic pain and the neurophysiology of emotions in pain in general and chronic pain in particular.

Few Biofeedback and Neurofeedback seminars consider the Bio-psychosocial model of pain, so we will be also talking about the physiological learning and social factors in chronic pain and its relation with the electrophysiology of acute and chronic pain. Normal and chronic pain electro physiological profiles are also considered.

Due to the lack of information in common Neurofeedback seminars about EEG patterns of pain; the seminar is designed to review the psychophysiological profiles and chronic pain treatment protocols in conjunction with both traditional and QEEG Neurofeedback procedures.

Normal, acute and chronic pain psychophysiological and neurophysiological readings are revisited in its relation to pain treatment protocols, (instrumentation and practice and report creation). Finally we review in detail Neurophysiological markers of acute and chronic pain, its use in assessment, treatment and relapse prevention.

This seminar is an excellent opportunity to learn from the expert and his experience about the noninvasive treatments for a health issue that has to be considered and managed as a disease in itself and requires a comprehensive treatment approach that has to be conducted by interdisciplinary health care groups.

Join the seminar and live the experience to be trained with the most reliable systems, outstanding interventions protocols and become an expert in management of one of the most costly and prevalent health issues in America today.

For more information about this article please contact the author:

Prof. Dr. Jorge J. Palacios-Venegas,
Applied Neurosciences specialist,

CEO of Biofeedback Centermr
(521)(55)39.66.12.20 (calling from or outside U. S.)

Skype: dr.jorge.j.palacios.venegas

Twitter: @palacciv

jorgepalacios@biofeedbackcentermr.com
www.biofeedbackcentermr.com
Additional information on the seminar:

http://biofeedbackinternational.com/palacios.htm

Technology and Stress

Thursday Apr 12, 2012

Thursday Apr 12, 2012


Technology is supposed to make our lives easier right?  In many ways it has.  Word processing, desktop publishing, database and many other software programs and personal computers allow us to do many things faster and less expensively than ever before.  Cell phones, smart phones, and tablets have made communications and computing portable and more convenient.  That’s the good news.  The not so good news is that with all of the advances, increased power, and time savings most of us just end up doing more which causes more stress.  Instead of using the saved time to relax we are now expected to get more done.  So is the technology causing stress?  Is technology bad because it is adding to our stress?  The way that some technology is used may in fact contribute to stress but biofeedback is a technology that can be used to help people learn to reduce their negative responses to stress.  Biofeedback technology allows the measurement of muscle tension, skin temperature, skin conductance, respiration, heart rate / heart rate variability, and EEG – brainwaves.   By using this technology people learn how to regulate their physiology to improve health and performance.  There many applications including mental health, pain management, rehabilitation, education, business, sports.
Erik Peper, Ph.D. is an expert in teaching people how to use biofeedback technology to reduce negative responses to stress.   Read more about this work and a workshop he will be teaching in New York City May 4-5, 2012. http://www.prweb.com/releases/2012/3/prweb9348942.htm
 
I receive many calls at my office from people in the general public looking for biofeedback providers in their area.  These calls come from all over the Unites States.  There are just not enough people providing biofeedback yet.  There is an opportunity for healthcare providers to expand their businesses by adding this service to their practice.  This can attract new clients as well as offer existing clients another service.
Harry L. Campbell
Biofeedback Resources International
www.biofeedbackinternational.com
www.mindbodydevices.com
Facebook: Biofeedback Resources International
Twitter: biofeedbackman
 

 
 

 
 

 

Friday Feb 10, 2012

Up to 90% of the doctor visits in the USA may be triggered by a stress-related illness, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
 
Biofeedback is an effective way to reduce the negative effects of stress.  Why is that important?  Because stress can make you sick and can even lead to death if uncontrolled.  We can learn to do something about stress.  Biofeedback helps you to control things like your heart rate, muscle tension, and brainwaves.  Your body should normally recover from stress reactions quickly and return to a normal, balanced state.  That doesn’t always happen.  Biofeedback measures how much change there is and in what direction it is.  You can then use biofeedback to measure the effects of techniques like guided relaxation, diaphragmatic breathing, and progressive muscle relaxation to see the positive effects and the return to a balanced state.
 
 
Here is a link to a good presentation on stress and illness:
http://bcs.worthpublishers.com/myers8einmodules/content/cat_570/PDFs/Module%2041.pdf
 
Here is an example of how stress can affect health.  Stress probably played a part in the quick death of former coach of the Penn State University football team Joe Paterno. 
 
Although he was at an advanced age he was still coaching up to a few months before he passed.  I strongly doubt that he would have passed so soon.  Imagine after such a record breaking, long career and the honor he received, to be fired and have his career end in a cloud of scandal.  Now that’s stress.  Here is an article that talks about it more.
 
http://yourlife.usatoday.com/sex-relationships/lifesolutions/post/2012-01-22/how-stress-may-have-played-a-role-in-paternos-death/609444/1
 
 
Harry L. Campbell
www.biofeedbackinternational.com  (healthcare professionals)
www.mindbodydevices.com   (general public)

Thursday Jan 19, 2012


On June 28, 2011 I went to the Westchester Airport to meet Erik Peper, Ph.D. We went straight to the Barnes and Noble Store on Central Avenue in Yonkers, Ny. He was scheduled to do a book signing for his new book that he authored along with Robert Gorter, MD, Ph.D. The title of the book is "Fighting Cancer, A Nontoxic Approach to Treatment". In this book many effective non-traditional cancer treatments are discussed. Traditional cancer treatments can often be ineffective and very unpleasant. I believe that we should be open to the other therapies that are available so that people can decide on how they will battle cancer if they find themselves in the position of dealing with it. There are also many things that can be done to reduce the likelihood of getting cancer in the first place.
Although this is not a biofeedback book it does teach many techniques that can be assisted by biofeedback like diaphragmatic breathing and muscle relaxation. This book is for all healthcare professionals as well as people who do not work in healthcare. No matter what you do for a living, you probably know someone who has been affected by cancer. You should read this book and give a copy to someone you care about.
I have been blessed to know Erik Peper for many years. He is a great asset to Biofeedback Resources International as part of our Health Training Seminars faculty. I hope to have him teach some workshops with us covering some of the material in this book.
The day after the book signing Erik began teaching a 5-Day BCIA Biofeedback Certification seminar for us. The class included healthcare professionals from various parts of the country. It was a great session.
Erik Peper will be teaching another BCIA Biofeedback Workshop for us this summer.  Visit our website: www.biofeedbackinternational.com for details.

Copyright © 2011 Harry Campbell. All rights reserved.

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