Neurofeedback and Change

This is a two minute video that says it all. You'll hear - and see - the transformation that occurred in an Australian man's life from his giving his brain NeurOptimal® training.

 

Do you have questions about how neurofeedback might change your life? Please leave a comment here or email me.

Catherine Boyer, MA, LCSW
New York Neurofeedback

Tedx Talk on Exercise and the Brain

NYU neuroscientist Wendy Suzuki talks at a TEDx conference about exercise, the brain, learning and memory.



One of the teachers who inspired Dr. Suzuki is Marian Diamond of the University of Berkeley Department of Integrative Biology. Dr. Diamond's research into the differences in the brains of rats living in enriched or impoverished environments (including those exercise wheels) demonstrated that the brain can change at any age. The old wisdom was that once adulthood was reached, we had the brain we were going to have. Not so.

What does this mean to us? Like those rats, our brains are able to change in the womb, and they can keep changing right up until the end. This is one of the reasons why neurofeedback can produce the kinds of changes it does.

Catherine Boyer, MA, LCSW
New York Neurofeedback

10,000 Sing Beethoven's Ode to Joy

This post isn't really directly related to neurofeedback. I'm posting this DatabaseofMusic YouTube video here because...

• It's beautiful
• It's uplifting
• Music and its effects on us are a fascinating aspect of our complex and amazing brains
• The video wonderfully demonstrates the possibilities in group energy and connection

If you are reading this and you have been depressed, did listening help you? It's likely that it did. Music has that power.

Joy is part of the spectrum of emotions we are supposed to have. Depression can take that away... please act to get it back. I have seen neurofeedback be very helpful with depression. Counseling, medications, aerobics, nutritional changes, time in nature, can also all help.

Catherine Boyer, MA, LCSW
New York Neurofeedback

Disconnect to Connect

This is a beautiful one and a half minute video that says – powerfully – something we mostly know already but don't do enough of: Disconnect to Connect. (The link is the photo, not the fractal.)

I usually try to summarize or describe videos for readers here, but... the only words in the video are at the end, and they're in Thai, and the video says it so well...

Catherine Boyer, MA, LCSW
New York Neurofeedback

NeurOptimal® Neurofeedback and "Chemo Brain"

As promised last week, this post is about the recently completed (2011) study of NeurOptimal® neurofeedback.

The study was done with cancer survivors with cognitive losses following chemotherapy – losses such as difficulty with memory, word finding, and multi-tasking. These side effects have been called chemo brain. Fatigue, sleep problems, depression and anxiety following chemotherapy are also common.

Unless it's happened to you or someone you're close to, you may not know about the possibility of these side effects – and that they may be lasting. Friend and colleague Jean Alvarez, who designed and conducted the study, has told me it may not be just the chemo that causes the side effects. They may be caused by the cancer itself or by the body's response to the cancer.

This study tested women who had been treated with chemo for breast cancer. Zengar's press release stated that the neurofeedback stabilized the cognitive degradation experienced during chemotherapy. Actually, it reversed the cognitive losses, post chemo.

That's even better. And, because it may not be the chemo causing the cognitive losses, those treated with radiation but not chemotherapy may also benefit.

I haven't worked with nearly as many people with chemo brain as Jean has; but with the clients I have had the results have been terrific – returning the clients to their original levels of functioning. It's wonderful to know how much neurofeedback can help with this – and with so much else.

Catherine Boyer, MA, LCSW
New York Neurofeedback

NeurOptimal® Neurofeedback Research

Zengar is the maker of NeurOptimal®, the state of the art brain training system used at New York Neurofeedback. Recently they sent out a press release about the research conference held in February of this year at Indian Wells, California. I was there and it was inspiring.

There were presentations on the use of NeurOptimal® with:

• PTSD with veterans
• Autism spectrum
• Attachment disorders
• Side effects of chemotherapy
• Alzheimers

How can neurofeedback be effective with such a variety of conditions (and more)? It's because it works directly with the central nervous system - the brain and spinal cord, which is obviously at the center of pretty much all of the ways we function.

One note I'd like to add to the press release: It states that NeurOptimal® was shown to "stabiliz[e] cognitive degradation for cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy." It's actually better than that. I'll be posting more about this next week. Meanwhile, you can link to an abstract of the study from this earlier post on the NYNF Blog, Chemo Brain Helped by Neurofeedback.

If you have any questions or comments, please leave them here on the blog or you can email me.

Catherine Boyer, MA, LCSW
New York Neurofeedback

Neurofeedback, NeurOptimal® and the End of Panic Attacks

Journalist Jan Murphy tells  his story of decades of anxiety and panic accompanied - as panic generally is - by a variety of unpleasant physical symptoms. All this ended with neurofeedback.

Jan doesn't say so in his article, How Cutting Edge Science Made my Fear Go Away, but his description of the state of the art brain training he received is clearly NeurOptimal®, the neurofeedback used at New York Neurofeedback.

Panic attacks are miserable. So is anxiety. I have personally seen anxiety greatly decrease and panic attacks disappear entirely with NeurOptimal® neurofeedback.


If you have questions or want to learn more, please post here or email me confidentially.

Catherine Boyer, MA, LCSW
New York Neurofeedback