BIOFEEDBACK

Biofeedback is a process for monitoring a body function such as breathing, heart rate, blood pressure and altering that function through relaxation or imagery.

Biofeedback is essentially a training system or means to reinforce positive new habits, especially new ways of responding to Stress.

Biofeedback is a treatment technique in which people are trained to improve their health by using signals from their bodies. Physical therapists for example, use Biofeedback to help stroke victims regain movement in paralyzed muscles. Psychologists use it to help tense and anxious clients learn to relax. Specialists in many fields use biofeedback to help their patients or clients cope with pain.

Through the verification of positive changes in Stress markers, clients learn to respond in a different manner to their Stressors. Focusing on positive and constructive thought one can reduce the probability of anxiety and stress related diseases.

Classic Biofeedback is essentially a one-way ‘read only’ system ‘feeding back’ to the client information on a variety of Stress indicators, including blood pressure, galvanic skin responses or brainwave activity. Standard Biofeedback is a time-tested and proven system to assist clients in Stress reduction.

Biofeedback monitors a physiological process, such as:

• electrical activity in muscle cells
• blood flow to hands or feet
• heart rate
• blood pressure
• breathing rate
• electrical activity in the brain

Changes in any of these physiological processes can be translated by the biofeedback instrument into signals, such as:

• lights that blink
• tones that change in pitch
• video displays such as graphs or pictures

The biofeedback therapist is specially trained to help you understand the meaning of this "feedback." The biofeedback therapist will also teach you muscle relaxation exercises, deep breathing, and visualization techniques that can be helpful in learning to change your physiological reactions. Together, you can find the relaxation methods that work for you.

Practice is important in learning new skills. As one improves relaxation skills through daily practice may experience physiological changes such as lower blood pressure, tension relief, better sleep or stress relief.

Conditions for which biofeedback may be helpful include:

• migraine headaches
• tension headaches
• anxiety
• essential hypertension
• injury-related muscle strain
• irritable bowel
• TMJ pain
• asthma
• chronic pain
• insomnia

Biofeedback does not "cure" a disease. Instead, persons using biofeedback learn to reduce symptoms and learn to recognize and minimize recurring patterns of stress by learning to remain calm and relaxed.

Scientists are just determining how it all works through a different medical approach - Quantum medicine. It is well documented that biofeedback does, in fact, teach patients how to control seemingly involuntary conditions of the nervous and circulatory systems.

In the 1960’s laboratory experiments were conducted to examine research subject’s brain wave activity, blood pressure, and other functions of the body, which are under normal situations, are not controlled voluntarily. The outcomes of these experiments was hoped to increase creativity at will-by a person being able to change their own brain patterns-or even more importantly, the ability to decrease ones own blood pressure, making prescription blood pressure medication unnecessary. Although this hope was found to be unrealistic, due to too many variables, it was recorded that biofeedback can help with other conditions such as chronic pain and stress reduction. Hence, the term biofeedback was born.

Quantum Biofeedback represents the major step in the evolution of standard or ‘classic’ Biofeedback. Quantum Biofeedback, on the other hand, recognizes that many of our Stressors lie below our conscious awareness, and can be lodged not only in the unconscious mind, but also in the various energetic systems in the body. We are energy at our source level. So we see that with Quantum Biofeedback, we are looking at an expanded relation of the body that includes information, consciousness and mind; not just as a physical system, but also being comprised of a number of energetic systems that must be taken into account for a truly comprehensive picture of how Stress is affecting us. As well as ‘feeding back’ to the client valuable data based on the subtle energetic reactions of the body to a variety of potential Stressors the practitioner in Quantum Biofeedback also has the option to instantaneously balance aberrant or dysfunctional Stress patterns, thus giving the client an ‘energetic boost’ in the direction of true Relaxation and Stress Reduction. Homeostasis, or the body’s natural balance, is the outcome of effective Stress Reduction.


Thank you for your insight and contribution on Biofeedback:
www.nlm.nih.gov/.../ency/imagepages/8734.htm
http://phxholistichealth.wordpress.com/2009/10/06/quantum-biofeedback/
www.maximenterprises.org/maxim/biofeedbackWha...