Huberman: Brief structured respiration practices enhance mood and reduce physiological arousal, HRV and vagus
One of the mail goals of my practice is to improve patients’ autonomic balance and increase vagal activity. I firmly believe if we can encourage vagal activity, we will see benefits to mood, immunity, pain all of which leads to longer life. Besides acupuncture, TAVNS, exercise, probiotics and good sleep, breathing is a key lever…
Read MoreVagus Nerve as Modulator of the Brain-Gut Axis in Psychiatric and Inflammatory Disorders
I’ve been alerted to ever more mention of the vagus nerve in the popular press. I’ve been interested in the vagus nerve and parasympathetic activity for longer than I choose to admit. That is why I measure Heart Rate Variability in the clinic to get a glimpse into patients’ parasympathetic tone overall and how it…
Read MoreExpiratory-gated Transcutaneous Auricular Vagus Nerve Stimulation (taVNS) does not Further Augment Heart Rate Variability During Slow Breathing at 0.1 Hz
This study is relevant because of the RAVANs technology that synchronizes TAVNS with expiration. In these authors study they use 100Hz which may nor may not be optimal, just as tragus and cavum concha may not be optimal. But nonetheless, they saw now difference in HRV. TAVNS is running up against real problems in showing…
Read MoreHRV and Photobiomodulation for Vagal and Sympathetic ANS modulation
If nothing else, I aim to improve my patients’ autonomic balance by increasing their vagal activity. Stimulating the vagus nerve indirectly to increase parasympathetic activity and decreasing sympathetic activity. Acupuncture can increase vagal activity as well as transcutaneous auricular vagal stimulation. I am extremely excited by this study. Not only does it validate my approach of…
Read MoreMedical Device Makers Spend Millions to loosen Regulations
This is an older article and back up for some of the writing I’m doing. It’s a good summary of the pressures to take these devices to market.
Read MoreEffects of transcutaneous auricular vagus nerve stimulation on the resting state of major depressive disorder
This study investigated the mechanism underlying the immediate effect of transcutaneous auricular vagus nerve stimulation (taVNS) on major depressive disorder (MDD). The study involved 58 MDD patients and 54 healthy controls who underwent taVNS treatment. They were looking at which brain areas were affected. . Their findings suggest that taVNS has an immediate modulatory effect…
Read MoreRita Redberg and Risks of Statins. Time to Curb Your Enthusiasm
I admire Dr. Redberg very much. She speaks truth to the “powers that be” pushing medications and imaging technologies and scantily researched medical interventions. (If you click on the photo it will take you to a great discussion on a podcast by ZDoggMD entitled “When Less is More in Health Care”). I’ve linked to her…
Read MoreChronic Pain and Heart Rate Variability in a Cross-Sectional Occupational Sample: Evidence for Impaired Vagal Control
In this article, the researchers measure Heart Rate Variability as a function of pain levels in 647 subjects. They found that parasympathetic activity was lower in patients with chronic pain. This is not at all surprising, but we can wonder if we improve HRV we can also improve patients pain. Again, autonomic balance influences so…
Read MoreThe Link Between Autonomic Nervous System and Rheumatoid Arthritis: From Bench to Bedside
As patients and readers of my blog know, I focus on the autonomic nervous system in my acupuncture practice. Autonomic balance has now been implicated in many different diseases, an important one is Rheumatoid Arthritis. Acupuncture improves autonomic balance and so does direct vagal stimulation. Both of these interventions improve autonomic balance and lower inflammatory…
Read MoreElectroacupuncture at ST25 for Parkinson’s disease constipation
I have treated many patients in the clinic who suffer from constipation and it really helps. This study investigated the effects of electroacupuncture (EA) at ST 25 on constipation in Parkinson’s disease (PD) rats. The researchers found that EA intervention relieved constipation symptoms and reversed the down-regulation of colonic autophagy markers in PD rats. The relationship…
Read More