Last week when my Dad was here he told me that my Uncle and Aunt were thinking about buying a hyperbaric chamber for my cousin Conner. Apparently there has been a lot of research on these chambers with their benefits and treatments for individuals with autism. Even though Conner has cerebral palsy and severe brain damage and not autism, I guess the pressure from hyperbaric chambers would still help him. I had never heard of using hyperbaric chambers being used for the treatment of autism and disabilities before, so I found a couple videos and articles. I found that there are a lot of hyperbaric therapy centers across the United States. There is also a lot of controversy between where the little amount of scientific proof gives enough evidence that they work. Here is one cite for a treatment center in California. On ABC news health website, I found an article titled, “Hyperbaric Autism Treatment Show Possible Promise” . Hyperbaric therapy is a procedure that has little scientific evidence backing it up for a treatment of autism but there are new studies that are ready to prove it has a valid treatment with replicated findings.
Here is one more article
And a pretty neat video. You should definitely watch it!!
I think that having more research and studies with hyperbaric chambers will be very important for the future of therapy and treatments. Even though there is not a lot of scientific proof that these hyperbaric chambers work, the parents are seeing changes in their children. I do not think that they are not just a waste of time and money. If children with autism are showing even just the smallest amount of progress from these chambers, I think that researchers are on the right track. And if my family ends up getting one for my cousin, I will let you know what happens.
My questions for yall (you all) are if you have ever heard anything about these hyperbaric chambers? And what do you think about them? Do you think it will become the “new thing” for therapy? Do you think these chambers with further research will be able to benefit all children with disabilities? And have you heard of any other new technologies being used for treatments or therapy?
