Biofeedback is a form of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) which involves measuring a subject's bodily processes such as blood pressure, heart rate, skin temperature, galvanic skin response (sweating), and muscle tension and conveying such information to him or her in real-time in order to raise his or her awareness and conscious control of the related physiological activities.

Biofeedback operates on the notion that we have the innate ability and potential to influence the automatic functions of our bodies through the exertion of will and mind. Biofeedback has recently been shown to give us what had previously seemed an impossible degree of control over a variety of physiologic events. It is a great tool to harness the power of mind-body medicine.

By providing access to physiological information about which the user is generally unaware, biofeedback allows users to gain control over physical processes previously considered automatic.

Interest in biofeedback has waxed and waned since its inception in the 1960s; at the beginning of the 21st century it is undergoing something of a renaissance, which some ascribe to the general upswing of interest in complementary and alternative medicine modalities. Neurofeedback has become a popular treatment for ADHD, electromyogram (muscle tension) biofeedback has been widely studied and accepted as a treatment for incontinence disorders, and small home biofeedback machines are becoming available for a variety of uses. Its role in controlling hypertension is becoming recognised

Biofeedback: Exciting and Empowering Process
 

Train Your Body to Mind

Biofeedback is useful in treating many disorders, ranging from the reeducation of damaged nerves to certain types of epilepsy, but it is most typically used in treating disorders like TMJ, irritable bowel syndrome, chronic headaches, high blood pressure, generalized stress, anxiety and insomnia. Biofeedback is a valuable option, because it is a noninvasive process that can be used to train you how to manage and change troublesome physical symptoms.

Biofeedback involves using electronic instrumentation to monitor specific, often unconscious physiological activities and habit patterns of your body and then "feed back" the information to you. Once you are aware of what your body is doing, you can change those patterns to reduce or eliminate your symptoms. Biofeedback is effective for chronic, benign problems because it reduces long term medication use, the frequency of emergency room visits, physician consultations and it has NO side effects. ~ LifeMatters.com

Types of Biofeedback Monitors & Instrumentation

Electromyogram (EMG)

This is the most common form of biofeedback measurement. An EMG uses electrodes or other types of sensors to measure muscle tension. By the EMG alerting you to muscle tension, you can learn to recognize the feeling early on and try to control the tension right away. EMG is mainly used as a relaxation technique to help ease tension in those muscles involved in backaches, headaches, neck pain and grinding your teeth (bruxism). An EMG may be used to treat some illnesses in which the symptoms tend to worsen under stress, such as asthma and ulcers.

Peripheral Skin Temperature

Sensors attached to your fingers or feet measure your skin temperature. Because body temperature often drops when a person experiences stress, a low reading can prompt you to begin relaxation techniques. Temperature biofeedback can help treat certain circulatory disorders, such as Raynaud's disease, or reduce the frequency of migraines. The physiological process behind the temperature drop associated with the stress response is quite simply vasoconstriction (blood vessels narrowed by the smooth musculature in their walls)

Galvanic skin response training

Sensors measure the activity of your sweat glands and the amount of perspiration on your skin, alerting you to anxiety. This information can be useful in treating emotional disorders such as phobias, anxiety and stuttering. This is the method most commonly used by lie detector machines. It is the most popular form of biofeedback, with over 500,000 hand-held GSR2 units having been purchased by consumers since the early 70's; it is also one of the biofeedback methods used by the video game series Journey to Wild Divine.

Electroencephalography (EEG)

An EEG monitors the activity of brain waves linked to different mental states, such as wakefulness, relaxation, calmness, light sleep and deep sleep. This is the least common of the methods, mostly due to the cost and availability of an EEG machine.

Biofeedback Training Testimonials from Several Supporting Notable People and Companies.

"Healing Rhythms is helping to transform our mass consciousness to one of peace and harmony through a very practical program that allows people to get in intimate touch with the innermost core of their being. To know that they have more power than they have ever realized, to know that they can influence what is happening in their body, in their mind, in their emotions, as well as in the world that they create everyday."

Deepak Chopra, M.D.
Author of the new release,
The Book of Secrets

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"His Holiness the Dalai Lama thanks you for sending Him as a gift your interactive computer game for teaching compassion. He is pleased to know that modern technology is being used for the purpose of teaching compassion. We are happy that you have sought the guidance of Nawang Khechog in producing this computer game."

Best wishes,
Tenzin Geyche Tethong, Secretary to
His Holiness the Dalai Lama
Office of H.H. the Dalai Lama

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 "The Journey to Wild Divine is more than a game, it’s a tool for the Mind-Body work we value. It certainly has proven so with me – and it’s a hit with my patients. It’s an outstanding product and since it’s amazingly inexpensive, I encourage my patients to use it as home practice. It’s complex and challenging enough that no one has gotten tired of using it."

Thomas M. Brod, MD, Sr. Fellow, BCIA,
American Board, Psychiatry & Neurology

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 "One of the most important tools you can incorporate into your daily life to effect not only the longevity of your life, but the quality of your life, is a deeper, slower breathing practice. The exercises in Healing Rhythms do just that."

Dr. Andrew Weil

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 “The Journey to Wild Divine trains people to think and feel in new ways. To be more creative, more imaginative, and to inspire to a much larger awareness, one that is superbly equipped to deal with the complex changes of modern life.”

Jean Houston, Ph.D.,
Author, The Possible Human
 

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