Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy in pain treatment

Hyperoxia triggered by Hyperbaric Oxygenation Treatment generates a series of physiological effects that produce multiple benefits. Among them, its analgesic and anti-inflammatory effect and the consequent relief in all pathologies that cause pain.

In inflammatory processes that produce pain, Hyperbaric Oxygen decreases the production of inflammatory interleukins such as interleukin 1, interleukin 6, tumor necrosis factor-alpha, and increases the production of anti-inflammatory interleukins such as interleukin 10.

It generates non-hypoxic vasoconstriction and reduces edema. Fluid extravasation contributes to its action in the processes where inflammation causes pain. That is why it can be useful in post-surgical recovery, severe trauma, burns, and complex wounds.

Hyperbaric Oxygen also promotes peripheral axonal regeneration, induces autophagy of damaged mitochondria, improves nerve transmission potential, mitochondrial functionality, and restores synaptic transmission.

It reduces neuropathic pain in pathologies such as spinal cord injuries, trigeminal neuralgia, phantom limb pain, neuropathic wounds, electrical burns, sciatica, post-chemotherapy neuropathic pain, post-stroke central neuropathic pain, and peripheral vascular pain.

Hyperbaric Oxygen produces endogenous opioid-like peptides with a powerful analgesic mechanism of action. For this reason, it is a very useful treatment as an adjunct to manage cancer pain.

In dysfunctional neurosensory syndromes, it was shown that the cerebral perfusion generated by hyperoxia restores functionality and decreases the sensitization of the central nervous system to nociceptive stimuli. Brain rectification leads to a decrease in pain, fatigue, and anxiety and improvement of motor functionality in patients with Fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, and complex regional pain.

The simultaneous action on tissue regeneration, healing, and reduction of inflammation is useful for pathologies with pain due to tissue damage. It not only reduces pain in wounds but also accelerates the healing process and reduces the cause of pain. This happens in different chronic ulcers such as diabetic ulcers, vascular ulcers, and vascular diseases associated with rheumatic diseases.

This process of tissue regeneration also occurs in Arthritis and Osteoarthritis, where Hyperbaric Oxygen has analgesic action, decreases apoptosis, produces cartilage regeneration, reduces hypoxia in the joint, and significantly reduces inflammation and pain.

Due to all these physiological effects triggered by hyperoxia in a systemic and simultaneous way, hyperbaric oxygen therapy is an adjunctive therapeutic tool in different pathologies with pain, even in difficult resolution chronic and neuropathic pain.

Sources

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