MOOD and ADDICTION
RECOVERY
BASIS FOR NEUROFEEDBACK WITH DEPRESSION AND ANXIETY
Recent studies using PET scans, SPECT scans and Functional
MRIs have shown that depression and anxiety are
characterized by abnormal rates of metabolism in specific
regions of the brain. These abnormalities correspond with
findings on EEG Brain Maps called Quantitative EEG that
show imbalances in brain activation. Over 120 scientific
studies describe and document the abnormal brain waves in
those with depression. Imbalances in activation of specific
frequencies in certain areas of the brain are found.
Coherence, or the brains ability to share information
between areas of the brain, is also unbalanced.
NeuroFeedback Training can address these imbalances
NEUROFEEDBACK AND ADDICTIONS
Neurofeedback can improve addictions treatment outcomes and
lead to better results than the best mainstream approaches
now available. The evidence for this is good—and likely
will be better when the results of some on-going studies
reach peer-reviewed journals. Treatment often begins with a
quantitative EEG and is individualized, but in most cases
it involves slowing down or speeding up the cortex. One
widely used process for slowing is called the “alpha-theta
protocol” or the Peniston protocol, after the researcher
Eugene Peniston who refined and researched it. The
technique actually goes back to the Menninger Clinic and
work by Elmer Green, Dale Walters, and Steve Fahrion over
thirty years ago.
Research has shown that success in alcohol treatment is
worse for those alcoholics who have the least alpha and
theta activity, and the most beta. This finding supplements
the discovery that alcoholics as a group have less alpha
and theta and relatively more beta than non-alcoholics.
That is, alcoholics form a continuum, with the most
cortically hyper aroused (those with less alpha and theta)
showing worse outcomes than others who are less hyper
aroused.
