Attention Deficit Disorder Clinic - Resources / Articles

Neurofeedback of S. Vermont, John Demos MA, LCMHC, BCIA-EEG
www.eegvermont.com

International Society for Neuronal Regulation
www.isnr.org

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Last resort treatment could be the first line of defense

Medication vs. EEG Neurofeedback

ADD is an inherited disorder based primarily on frontal lobe dysfunction, usually caused by a lack of normal blood flow and metabolism. The frontal lobes are responsible for attention, so it is difficult to sustain focused attention, particularly on boring tasks, for children and adults with ADD.
There are only two research proven interventions to correct this dysfunction: medication like Ritalin, and EEG Neurofeedback or Biofeedback. Both have many peer-reviewed journal research studies to demonstrate their effectiveness.

What are the pros and cons of both? Stimulant medications were discovered in 1937 to be an effective treatment for ADD and they have proven the test of time. They kick in immediately, are well-tolerated, and approximately 80% to 90% will respond to at least one of the several available. However, there may be side-effects in some cases; they may need to be taken the rest of the person’s life (which is very expensive); they do not cover the disorder for 24 hours; and it is difficult to obtain new insurance or enter the military. The biggest disadvantage is that many adolescents and young adults stop taking them, perhaps when they need them most. EEG Neurofeedback is more expensive initially because a QEEG Topographic brain map ($495) is important, and 30 to 50 sessions are necessary on average to remediate the frontal lobe dysfunction – usually excessively elevated slow brain wave activity. Eighty to 90% respond well, as measured by computerized tests, rating scales and grades. The improvements appear to be permanent. There are rarely any side effects, IQ increases 9 to 15 points and often other disorders improve simultaneously such as depression, anxiety, head injuries, and learning disabilities, to name only a few. In the long run, it is much less expensive. In severe cases, both interventions may be necessary for optimal improvements.

Either intervention should ideally be combined with a multi-modal approach: behavior modification, study skills, attention training exercises, frustration coping skills, positive self-talk, etc. The ADD Clinic lets parents and adults choose from all the available treatment options, including medication and EEG Neurofeedback, and with computerized testing we can usually determine the optimal medication dose within 2.5mgs.

Last-resort treatment could be the first line of defense for psychological disorders

By the time Betty found the Scottsdale Neurofeedback Institute, she was desperate. A once-successful architect, Betty was bright, personable and level-headed. But she was also so anxious about germs and contamination and so burdened by Obsessive Compulsive Disorder that she could no longer work or even leave her house. Only in her mid-40’s, Betty was looking at a dismal future filled with isolation and fear.

No medicine or combination of medications had worked for her, so she didn’t have particularly high hopes when she met Robert Gurnee, director of the Scottsdale Neurofeedback Institute. She knew, though, that she had nothing left to lose and everything to gain.

Gurnee is used to being the last resort for patients with OCD, depression, ADD, dyslexia, and even strokes, alcoholism and head injuries. The technology he uses is Quantified EEG Topographic Brain Mapping, in which a patient’s brain is electricity is measured, mapped and then compared to the readings of people with normal brain waves and no mental health problems. Once the abnormal areas of the brain are located, the patient uses a sort of hands-free video game to retrain their brain waves.

Like a large majority of patients Gurnee has seen since implementing this technology more than seven years ago, Betty’s brain waves and her entire life, really, were turned around thanks to SNI and the 25-year-old technology of EEG Neurofeedback.

“She had been on every medication and to numerous university psychiatric institutes for 30 years, none of which have helped her,” Gurnee says, “We trained her abnormal brainwaves down through video games, and after 25 sessions she was working again. Today, more than a year later, she is still doing fine, without medication and the side-effects she had from them.”

Subjects’ brain waves are painlessly retrained when they play a video game. For example, a figure of Superman on a screen will fly only when a patient uses their brain, not their hands, to control him. Gurnee says that the number of sessions needed varies, and the cost in the long run is cheaper than medication.

Once treatment is complete, says Gurnee, no follow-up sessions are needed. While the treatment sounds almost too good to be true, Gurnee says the technology is really quite simple and has been proven effective in numerous research studies for a variety of disorders.

“It is rewarding to me that we are helping people with previously untreatable disorders to make rapid and dramatic progress,” he says. “Because of what we do, people are able to succeed in school and at work, improve their relationships and know for the first time in a long time what it means to be normal and without worry or anxiety. They are free to live their lives again.”

Are you an addict?

Can't turn off your worries?

Anxiety is no fun and causes needless suffering. There are two types of anxiety: 1) cognitive and 2) physiological. Cognitive anxiety is excessive worry and fear, and difficulty turning them off. Physiological anxiety is from hyperarousal: restlessness, nervousness, insomnia, irritability and feeling tense or wired.

Robert Gurnee, MSW, director of the Scottsdale Neurofeedback Institute, has recently completed groundbreaking research by reviewing the QEEG Topographic Brain Maps of 100 patients with high levels of anxiety. He found six subtypes, some primarily the cognitive excessive worrying subtype and some with the physiological hyper-arousal worrying subtype. Most patients had a combination of the QEEG subtypes and suffered from both excessive worry and hyper-arousal. The QEEG can help predict medication response or non-response and can be used to plan EEG neurofeedback interventions to retrain the brain to decrease the abnormal patterns. For example, as the excessive Beta subtype (hyper-arousal) is trained down, patients begin to sleep better, and feel more relaxed and calm and less irritable. Training down elevated Theta in the cingulate enables people to learn to increasingly turn off their worries at will. When finished, there is usually no need for medication, and the results are usually long lasting.

Jill came to Scottsdale from Minnesota to be brain mapped. She had heard of Gurnee’s research at a recent international brain research conference and felt this was her last hope. None of the 30 medications for her anxiety and obsessive compulsive disorder had helped. She had to quit her job as a professor and was doing research out of her home on the internet and over the phone. Her fear of germs had overwhelmed her, and she could not turn off the fears, even though she knew they were silly. Forty sessions of training Beta (fast electricity) down over the cingulate by playing video games (where the only way to earn points is by decreasing the micro-volts of Beta) changed her life. She is now back to her busy professorship and leading a normal life. The fears are almost gone, and when they do begin to return, she can now turn them off.

The Scottsdale Neurofeedback Institute is internationally respected. Gurnee is immediate past-president of the International Society of Neuronal Regulation and is currently president of the EEG Neurofeedback Division of the Association of Applied Physiology and Biofeedback. He has ongoing research studies on a generalized anxiety disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder, ADHD, depression, learning disabilities and other disorders.

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