Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy
In this video, Ralph Potkin spends about 21 minutes speaking on "Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy" at the 34th Annual Cancer Convention held on Labor Day weekend by the Cancer Control Society.
About Ralph Potkin
RALPH POTKIN, M.D. received his Medical Degree from Chicago Medical School in Illinois. His post graduate training included a Residency in 1975 in Internal Medicine and Fellowships in Cardiology and Pulmonary Medicine, all at the University of Washington in Seattle.
Dr. Potkin is board certified in Internal Medicine, Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine and Hyperbaric Medicine. He is a Clinical Professor of Medicine at the UCLA School of Medicine in California.
Dr. Potkin is the Medical Director of the Beverly Hills Center for Hyperbaric Medicine. His Clinic is the only nationally accredited independent Hyperbaric Medical Center in the entire United States. Dr. Potkin has over 20 years of experience in this unique field of Hyperbaric Medicine. Patients come to his Clinic from all around the world to take advantage of this treatment modality to enhance healing in a variety of medical conditions including improving results in patients undergoing cosmetic surgery.
Dr. Potkin is an expert scuba diver and he has explored underwater many areas of the globe including the Antartica. He serves as a Medical Advisor to the Dive Alert Network and has a special interest in scuba diving and asthma. Presently, Dr. Potkin is the physician for the United States Breath-Hold team. In addition, he is actively involved in clinical research of heart, lung and brain function in these amazing elite athletes.
Under Dr. Potkin’s direction, the Beverly Hills Center for Hyperbaric Medicine treats a wide variety of medical problems including cancer patients, diabetics, patients with circulation problems, difficult to heal wounds, patients with stroke and traumatic brain injury and more recently patients within the Autism Spectrum.
Dr. Potkin can be reached at the Beverly Hills Center for Hyperbaric Medicine by phone 310-551-1375, by visiting his website at www.hyperbaricrx.com or by email at [email protected].
Transcription
Thank you very much. It's a pleasure to be here. I'm glad you invited me.
I have some brochures that I'll be glad to pass out to anybody who's interested in getting a little more information about our facility.
Listen to that right at the break. Great.
I'm going to talk to you today about what hyperbaric medicine is, what explains some of the science behind it. Discuss what it's good for and what it's not good for, where you should be able to get it and what kind of considerations you should consider when you're looking for a hyperbaric facility for treatment.
So what is hyperbaric medicine?
This is just a reminder from a trip that I was on going to Galapagos to explore hyperbaric principles and scuba divers. And this is to show you that horses in this that of pursuing hyperbaric medicine therapy is not just a shadow in the sky.
Hyperbaric oxygen is simply oxygen under pressure.
And the type of pressure that's used and the type of concentration of oxygen depends on the particular problem that we're treating.
So hyper burek means extra pressure, oxygen under pressure. It's interesting that hyperbaric oxygen therapy is probably one of the most underutilized areas of treatment that we have even at the big hospitals in Los Angeles and other cities. Even the doctors aren't sure what the indications are for hyperbaric medicine. We did a study and sent out some questionnaires to doctors and asked them what treatment, what diseases should be treated with hyperbaric oxygen and why they don't use it.
And we found out that half of them didn't even half of the doctors didn't know what the indications were. And half of them, the other half didn't even think that it worked. So that was one of the biggest problems that this treatment modality is not getting to. Out to the public.
Hyperbaric oxygen is delivered in a type of chambers. And we have two different types of chambers, primarily what we call a monoplanes chamber and a double and a multiplayer chamber. And the double lock is one in between. Monoplane means that just one person can go into the chamber at a time in a multi place chamber. It can accommodate different numbers of people and they have their advantages and disadvantages.
This is an example of one type of a multiplayer chamber. There's a door that gets in here. There's a technician or two outside.
The patient can go in and goes inside with either a hyperbaric technician or nurse or a doctor or somebody who is going to be keeping an eye on the patient.
This is another example of a