Wider medical acceptance
Neurofeedback would achieve wider acceptance based on the existing research and publications (see excerpts below) if funding would support the education efforts. The funding doesn't exist. Not enough MD's and psychologists have been educated about the research, the clinical work or the neuroscience.
Let's be practical. It's not just research that drives acceptance. It's having noted MD's and psychologists - including academics, actively promoting something as a new clinical tool to colleagues, along with the research. That too is typically funded in some way. Without large funding, gaining access to key influencers doesn't happen. This is a description of course of "the system."
It's actually remarkable that the field has continued to grow as well as it has without that support. Individual clinicians have taken on the role of educating other colleagues. In many discussions, it's clear they are driven by the outcome success of their patients using neurofeedback.
In our opinion, what's holding back this field is a lack of knowledge about the tool. And the challenge of helping both consumers and professionals understand a new concept that is not on it's surface intuitive. Can you really change sleep by hearing beeps? Or depression? Or anxiety? It's an impossible concept initially. Some find it incredibly appealing. But till you see it work, all the explanation doesn't mean nearly as much.
We are working to help provide more courses and more presence at major conferences. The goal: more education. This web site is specifically designed for the same reason.
Clinical Neuroscience Journal
Frank Duffy is a noted Harvard Neurologist. He wrote in an editorial about Neurofeedback after doing an in-depth review of the literature:
" . . . In my opinion, if any medication had demonstrated such a wide spectrum of efficacy it would be universally accepted and widely used."
Major Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Journal
Child & Adolescent Psychiatric Clinics of North America, January 2005.
Emerging Interventions:
Focus – Neurofeedback, Transcranial Stimulation, Vagus Nerve Stimulation
This medical journal has been around many years. It is well respected by child and adolescent psychiatrists. The bulk of the January 2005 issue focused on neurofeedback as an emerging intervention. Dr. Hirshberg, the editor, was one of the presenters at the American Psychiatric Association neurofeedback workshop in May 2004.
The first chapter is titled “Emerging brain based interventions for children and adolescents: overview and clinical perspective.” It’s written by the editors, Laurence Hirshberg, Ph.D. at Brown, Sufen Chiu, MD, PhD, (Dept of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of California – Davis), and Jean Frazier, MD (Department of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School). It was a very positive and encouraging article to psychiatrists.
The preface from the journal by Dr. Hirshberg is included at the bottom of this email and could be worth reading.
Excerpted from the journal:
". . . virtually all the EEG biofeedback research has demonstrated what three recent fMRI studies have replicated. . . we are able to use real-time information about brain function to alter and enhance that function." ". . . which suggests that neurofeedback . . . is applicable to functional brain disorders . . . " Laurence Hirshberg, Ph.D. , Sufen Chiu, MD, PhD, and Jean Frazier, MD ,
"Although research in nonlinear or dynamic systems consistently has revealed the regulating power of feedback in complex systems . . . individuals accustomed to more linear based thinking in western medicine and psychology may find it hard to believe that merely showing the brain to itself (through feedback) has the same strength of effect as a carefully controlled psychoactive medication." Chapter one: Overview and clinical perspective, by the authors.
Mike Cohen editorial note The comment above may contribute to slow acceptance of neurofeedback. However, in my experience, the bigger issue is education. I have not met an MD or psychologist who rejected neurofeedback once they had a reasonable explanation of the action and mechanisms. The challenge is - it can take 20 minutes to an hour or more for a reasonable explanation. MD's are always pressed for time.
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