Stroke Therapy

Most people recovering from a stroke find out about us since we are one of the most cost effective places to get Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy. However we have found that Hyperbaric Oxygen therapy is far more effective when accompanied with our Conductive Education programs.

What is Conductive Education?

The brain injury from a stroke acts like a road block stopping the messages from getting through to the muscle groups and that's what's causing your problems of movement. The limbs are still capable of movement, but the brains ability to instruct them to move is impaired. However the brain is truly amazing and if you do the right things you can actually teach it to create new pathways, enabling it to once again take control of your muscles. There's a whole science behind knowing how to create those alternate pathways and that's what Conductive Education is all about. This is where it differs from other therapies. Our Conductors have a 4 year university degree from the Peto Institute and then spend more years as an intern after that. Instead of general training to treat every type of injury, the Conductors education is very specialized, specifically overcoming the problems of movement resulting from a brain injury. Conductive Education might look similar to physiotherapy with a lot of repetitive movement, but our Conductors have the extensive training and experience necessary to know exactly which movements will be the most effective for your stroke recovery.

We were the first full time facility in North America to offer Conductive Education and have been offering it to children with Cerebral Palsy for over 12 years. Keep in mind that CP and Stroke are very similar injuries. They are both a brain injury that results in problems of movement with one happening at birth and the other one later in life. We've treated thousands of children with CP. Their parents have tried every different type of therapy there is and they consistently tell us Conductive Education is the most effective therapy for a brain injury by far, with nothing else coming even close.

We started getting serious about Stroke Therapy 2 years ago. This happened after we treated a few and were very impressed by the results. Even if Conductive Education offers children their best results, while they are still growing and developing they can at least make some gains with other therapies. However with stroke people are told "anything you haven't got back in the first 90 days you might never get back". But we've helped people as much as 15 years after there Stoke and have still seen significant gains. So even if you aren't getting results with other types of therapy, it is not too late and there is still hope using Conductive Education.

What is Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy?

When you breathe normal air you are absorbing about as much oxygen as you can get. So long as you have healthy lungs, even if you were to breathe pure oxygen at normal air pressure you couldn't absorb any more. However if we put you in a chamber and increased the pressure to 1.5 atmospheres which is fairly gentle, about twice the pressure difference you would get on an airplane, then you can absorb far more oxygen. I don't mean just a little more oxygen. I mean w-a-y more oxygen. Normally the oxygen is carried by the red blood cells. Not only will you get a lot more oxygen in the red blood cells, the oxygen will actually get right into the blood plasma itself, into the Lymphatic system and into all sorts of nooks and crannies it normally couldn't get to. This extra oxygen in the body does wonderful things for all sorts of different ailments. Basically anything that can heal naturally over time seems to heal much faster and heal like a much younger person.

Why are Conductive Education and Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy more effective together?

Specifically in the case of stroke, the extra oxygen is carried up into the Brain. Keep in mind the brain uses 25% of the oxygen we take in. It is less than 3% of the body mass, but it uses 25% of the oxygen. So the brain loves this extra oxygen, making it easier to create the alternate pathways I talked about in Conductive Education. So Conductive Ed. does better when it is combined with Hyperbarics.

On the flip side, Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy also does much better when it's combined with Conductive Ed. Doing Hyperbaric research on the net you should find lots of people who say things like "best thing since sliced bread, it did wonderful things for my stroke". But you might find some other people who say "I am not so sure it was worth our while. We got some pretty good gains, but they didn't seem to last, they weren't like permanent results." At Ability Camp we have already done over 30,000 hyperbaric sessions which is much more than most places. We know from experience if you want to make your gains permanent you need to associate them with the appropriate activity to use the gains that you get. Hyperbarics can be used to treat all sorts of different types of ailments. Let's say it was a diabetic who was looking for better blood flow. They should be doing lots of cardiovascular exercises in between there hyperbaric sessions to really get that blood pumping and flowing through their body and that would lock in their gains and make their gains permanent. In the case of someone recovering from a stroke the ideal way to lock in their gains is Conductive Ed, since we're not just working on their gross motor skills and fine motor skills. We're working on their cognitive abilities, on speech and all those mundane tasks they use to take for granted, the feeding themselves, dressing themselves and going to the washroom. Everything they need to become an independent person again. Conductive Education locks in all of those gains and makes them all permanent for the Hyperbarics. A good analogy is diet and exercise, either one can help you lose weight, but both are far more effective when they are combined together.

Is there any medical proof for Hyperbarics?

In the past there has been a lot of debate about Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy. Some Doctors couldn't see any medical reason why extra oxygen in the body should do all the wonderful things people claim it does. That could lead them to the mistaken assumption that it was some sort of sham or a placebo. However there was a recent medical study published on stem cells. They proved that Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy increases stem cell production by 8 times the amount. What I didn't know is your body naturally produces stem cells. They come out of your bone marrow. They are big part of how you heal yourself. It's this natural production of stem cells that gets increased. Not an 80% increase, an 800% increase, eight times the amount. They even went so far as to state Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy was the safest and most effective way to get more stems cells. Your body can reject foreign stem cells that are artificially injected, but it loves the ones it produces naturally. Since they know how effective stem cells are, this research might be used as a basis to prove why Hyperbarics does many of the wonderful things people claim it does.

How long does it take?

Our Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy is 40 one hour sessions spread out over 3 weeks. Our Adult Conductive Education program is also done over the same 3 weeks. We offer free accommodations and are the only place in the world we know of that offers a combination of Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy and Conductive Education for adults with stroke.

What are the free accommodations like?

We are not a five star hotel and we are not a nursing home. We were set up to be as inexpensive as possible and still offer the best possible therapy you can find anywhere in the world. You have your own room with a double bed and a single bed, so you can bring someone with you. Your room has a little dresser with a TV, a telephone and an internet connection, but that's about it, the room is pretty sparse much like a dorm room. There is a shared kitchen where you do your own cooking. If you are not able to cook for yourself, bathe yourself or dress yourself, you must bring someone with you to help. Our building is handicap friendly. The accommodations, kitchen, Hyperbaric Chamber and Conductive Education room are all close together on one floor. Some people are afraid it will be too cold in the winter, but we keep the building warm enough to wear shorts and a T-shirt if you want. Once you're here you only need to go outside for groceries when necessary. So booking our soonest opening, regardless of the season is the best idea.

What kind of results can I expect from this?

If you are looking for some sort of quick fix, a miracle cure that involves little or no effort on your part, you are going to be very disappointed. We can teach how and what to do, but it is going to demand a great deal of effort on your part. As with everything in life, hard work pays off. We are going to custom tailor exercises according to your needs and abilities. We are going to challenge you to do more that you ever thought you could. You are going to see the results! You will regain your self esteem and self confidence.

If you would be thrilled with incremental gains in many different areas, then we can help. For instance starting to regain some control of a hand that seemed dead before; allowing you to walk further and faster; making it easier to form thoughts and express them to people or even to accomplish mundane things like feeding or dressing yourself, then we can help. If you are looking for renewed hope, that things are starting to improve and it is no longer all down hill from here, then you have come to the right place.

My stroke was years ago, is it too late?

We have treated people over 15 years after their stroke and still seen significant gains. So we don't think it is ever too late. However the sooner you do the therapy the easier it is to make gains. The longer you wait the harder you have to work to make the same gains. So you should come see us as quickly as possible.

What is the Success Rate?

So far the success rate for our Stroke Therapy program which is a combination of Conductive Education and Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy has been 100%. By that I don't mean everyone recovered 100%, that's not reasonable to ask from a 3 week program. I mean that so far we have seen gains in 100% of the people that were accepted into and completed our combined Stroke Therapy program. Keep in mind that every brain injury is unique and just because everyone else has had success so far is no guarantee that you will. With our help and a lot of effort on your part, the outlook is very, very promising.

For more information and to receive a Free DVD call Kevin (Director)at 1-800-442-6992 or email to kevin@abilitycamp.com