In March of 2006 it became fairly apparent that my 1-year old nephew was showing signs of autism. Although the official diagnosis was not made until 2 years later, I began researching alternative treatments for autism. What I discovered changed my life forever!
I can remember the day as if it were yesterday. My sister walked in the door with tears welling in her eyes. She wanted to cry but she also wanted to remain strong for her little boy. She had just arrived from the pediatrician's office where she had received the devastating news. Although the diagnosis was not definitive at that time, it's impossible to diagnose autism in a 1 year old child, the signs were there. My sister looked at me as one lone tear found its way from her eye and down her cheek, and asked me if I could help him. We had always been an extremely close family and our love and compassion for one another remains strong in our adult years. As I fought back my own tears I held her in my arms and told her I would try.
Now autism was not a condition I was all too familiar with so I knew I had my work cut out for me. Sifting through the thousands of internet pages filled with drug company propaganda was no small feat. However as I was perusing the literature I kept running across case studies of autistic children responding very well to neurofeedback. The stories were compelling. I read case after case of children responding to this non-invasive, drugless approach to a devastating condition. At that point in my career I was familiar with biofeedback but I was not all that familiar with neurofeedback. I knew what it was but I really had no firsthand experience with it so I began reading. The first book I read, A Symphony in the Brain, written by Jim Robbins provided me with the basic foundation for me to build upon and fueled my passion for this new subject. For the next year I immersed myself in neurofeedback; I learned everything I could. I was so excited and so motivated that my mind absorbed the information like a sponge. I discovered that, in addition to affecting autism and Asperger’s, this powerful new technology was changing the lives of people suffering with ADD/ADHD, learning disorders, memory loss, migraines, tension headaches, chronic pain, fibromyalgia and insomnia. I began to realize that this was my future – this was my destiny.
However the process I was about to embark on was a lot more difficult than I had realized. As a Board Certified Chiropractic Physician I possessed the necessary knowledge and credentials to incorporate neurofeedback into my practice; however the learning curve was a lot longer and steeper than I had realized. In addition, the equipment at the time was still in its infancy. It was big, cumbersome and not very user friendly. In fact the software still ran on MS-DOS. By the spring of 2008 I had completed my training, purchased my neurofeedback machine and was ready to begin offering it to my patients. My first patient was an 8 year old boy named Jason. He was diagnosed with ADHD one month prior to our first visit. Jason’s pediatrician had prescribed Ritalin and told Jason’s parents, Jen and Don, that he would probably need to be on the medication for the rest of his life. Jen and Don were not convinced that this was their only option but the teachers at the school were pressuring them to get him on medication. His behavior had become unruly, he was not getting along with other children and his grades were failing so Jen decided to try neurofeedback. We began training Jason in April of 2008 and by the second week; Jen and Don had noticed that he sat still throughout diner – the first time in as long as they could remember. On the 4th week the teacher gave Jen a call to thank her for getting him on the medication. When the teacher found out that Jason was not on any medications she was shocked. Jen told her about the neurofeedback and the teacher said – “keep doing whatever it is that you’re doing”. She said that his grades had improved and he no longer disrupts the class. She even reported that he was playing with the other children more.
During the rest of that year, I experienced incredible results with patients suffering from adult and childhood ADD/ADHD, memory loss, insomnia, chronic pain, migraines, tension headaches and even fibromyalgia. However despite these results, I recognized that there were some shortcomings in the software, equipment and procedures to the neurofeedback system I was using. That is when I decided to embark on creating my own system which is known today as NeuroCore Therapy. I partnered with a medical device manufacturer with 20 years of experience in the development of neurofeedback devices, and with a software designer that had written programs for IBM, Cisco and General Electric. Together we created user friendly system that reduced the training time of a typical neurofeedback session from 1 hour down to 20 minutes. In addition the new NeuroCore system reduced the number of training sessions from 50 down to 20. Now a doctor could provide a more effective therapy in a shorter session and for a shorter time and get the same incredible results!
Before I sign off let me bring you up to date on my nephew. One of the guidelines for neurofeedback and autism is that you don’t do neurofeedback on a child under the age of 5. This is because neurofeedback requires the participant to be able to follow instruction and unfortunately most autistic children under the age of 5 simply can’t follow the instruction. The good news is that my nephew turns 5 in a few months! So check back and follow my blog – I will be sure to keep you posted on his progress.
Warmest Regards,
Guy Annunziata, DC