HBOT Conversations:
Dr. Paul Harch & Inflammation
Dr. Paul G. Harch, M.D. has used hyperbaric oxygen therapy to treat more than 100 different conditions, including stroke, dementia, autism, and traumatic brain injury. His goal is to help his patients get their lives back using hyperbaric oxygen therapy.
He is the author of The Oxygen Revolution and is considered an International expert and pioneer in the field of Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy (HBOT). His informative, and comprehensive guide on HBOT has helped countless souls better understand what HBOT is and how it directly affects the body at the genetic level.
This episode on Inflammation is the first in a 9 episode series that will be released weekly with Dr. Harch.
Watch the Podcast
HBOT News podcast host, Edward di Girolamo, talks with special guest and HBOT expert, Dr. Paul G. Harch, MD. This is the first of nine episodes with Dr. Harch examining the God-given miracle of Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy.
In this episode, we dive into how HBOT is a game-changer for inflammation. Harch explains that inflammation is the driving factor for countless chronic illnesses, but thankfully Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy is a natural proven way to suppress inflammation.
Harch summarizes a fascinating study done in 2008, by Dr. Cassandra Godman. Her team took skin biopsies and extracted the normal tissue, then they examined the cells that lined the tiniest blood vessels in the tissue. Next, they put these cells in a petri dish and put them in a hyperbaric chamber and gave him a single hyperbaric treatment. Afterwards, they did a mass gene array analysis for 48 hours. What happened next was ground-breaking in better understanding the role that HBOT has on inflammation.
At the end of 24 hours 8,101 of our 19,000 protein coding genes in our 23 chromosomes were either significantly turned on or turned off & suppressed. That single HBOT treatment turned on the anti-inflammatory genes and the growth and repair hormone genes, and the largest cluster suppressed were the pro-inflammatory genes.
Our inflammatory reaction is inescapable when an injury occurs. But, when the patient receives hyperbaric oxygen therapy treatment after an injury (the sooner the better), it can have an overwhelming positive influence on the inflammatory reaction at any place along the spectrum. Harch continues to explain that the anti-inflammatory effects of hyperbaric oxygen are wide-ranging.
Harch spoke of the Navy’s experience with Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy, as the Navy really kind of dominated this field for many years. The Navy reported that if you can get someone in a chamber within one hour of coming out of the water – when they’re symptomatic for decompression sickness – then the first hyperbaric treatment is curative in 90% of cases. Everyone thought that HBOT was treating bubbles in the brain at that point, but the reality is they were treating inflammation. We now know that it’s the inflammatory reaction in the brain after the bubbles passed that Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy is treating; not the bubbles.
HBOT isn’t new, it dates back well over a hundred years. It’s still misunderstood, because many believe that HBOT therapy is a treatment for diseases. But, the reality is that HBOT is a treatment for disease processes, and it’s these processes that cause the diseases. We treat the inflammation that causes the disease processes, and in turn we treat the disease. That’s the power of Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy.
Stay tuned for all nine episodes that will be release each Friday for the next eight weeks.
Guest

Dr. Paul G. Harch, MD
Dr. Paul G. Harch, M.D. is a clinician in emergency medicine and hyperbaric medicine who is the former director of the University Medical Center Hyperbaric Medicine Department and LSU Hyperbaric Medicine Fellowship. Currently, he is a Clinical Professor of Medicine in the Section of Emergency Medicine at LSU School of Medicine in New Orleans. He graduated from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine after graduating from the University of California at Irvine with magna cum laude/Phi Beta Kappa honors.
Dr. Harch initiated and continues to be a private practice that has resulted in the largest case experience in neurological hyperbaric medicine in the world. In this practice, he adapted the concepts of conventional hyperbaric oxygen therapy to wounds in the central nervous system, which spawned the subsequent academic and research practice. Harch HBOT is the best place to receive oxygen therapy treatments, and patients have traveled from more than 50 countries to be treated by Dr. Harch himself.
Harch HBOT – Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy Clinic
5216 Lapalco Blvd.
Marrero, LA
504-309-4948
hbot@hbot.com
https://hbot.com/
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Recent HBOT News
Hyperbaric oxygen therapy restored traumatic stress-induced dysregulation of fear memory and related neurochemical abnormalities.
Individuals with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) are characterized by fear memory problems and hypocortisolemia of which traumatic stress-induced monoaminergic disruption over infralimbic (IL) cortex is considered the key mechanism. Hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) has recently proven its utility in treating several mental disorders but remains unexplored for PTSD. The present study aimed to examine the effects of 5-day HBO paradigm on traumatic stress (single prolonged stress, SPS, an animal model of PTSD)-induced dysregulation of fear memory/anxiety profiles and related abnormalities in IL monoamines and plasma corticosterone.
Hyperbaric oxygen therapy is an effective adjunctive treatment for severe perianal Crohn’s disease
Abstract: BACKGROUND: Perianal involvement occurs in about 30% of children with Crohn's disease (CD). Treatment of perianal CD requires a multidisciplinary approach with a combination of immunomodulatory therapy, antibiotics and surgery. Hyperbaric oxygen...
Hyperbaric oxygen promotes neural stem cell proliferation by activating vascular endothelial growth factor/extracellular signal-regulated kinase signaling after traumatic brain injury.
Hyperbaric oxygen (HBO) therapy and neural stem cell (NSC) transplantation can improve traumatic brain injury (TBI) clinically. This study aimed to investigate the mechanism of HBO promoting NSC proliferation and neurological recovery after TBI. Twenty-four Sprague-Dawley rats were divided randomly into three groups: a sham group, a TBI group (constructed using Feeney’s free-fall method), and an HBO-treated TBI group. Neurological function was evaluated by Neurological Severity Scores on days 1, 3, and 7, and we found that TBI-induced poor neurological function was improved by HBO. On day 7 after TBI, we observed that TBI promoted NSC proliferation, migration to the lesion area, and the levels of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), VEGFR2, Raf-1, MEK1/2, and phospho-extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK) 1/2 protein, which were further boosted by HBO, from immunohistochemistry, immunofluorescence, and Western blot experiments. In vitro, cell injury was applied to NSCs isolated from neonatal Sprague-Dawley rats by the Cell Injury Controller II system. Moreover, data from the BrdU Kit and Western blot showed that in-vitro HBO significantly accelerated NSC proliferation and the levels of proteins related to cell cycle and the VEGF/ERK pathway after cell injury, which was suppressed by the VEGFR2 inhibitor. Taken together, this study indicated that HBO may promote NSC proliferation by activating VEGF/ERK signaling and play a crucial role in neuroprotection after TBI.

