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Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy
Fibromyalgia
Fibromyalgia is a disorder characterized by widespread musculoskeletal pain accompanied by fatigue, sleep, memory and mood issues. Researchers believe that fibromyalgia amplifies painful sensations by affecting the way your brain and spinal cord process painful and nonpainful signals.
HBOT provides increased oxygen to the blood which helps heal damaged brain tissue, reduces inflammation, promotes the growth of new tissue and blood vessels, and improves general blood flow and oxygen delivery to the body.
Studies on Fibromyalgia and HBOT
Ruth Izquierdo-Alventosa, Marta Inglés, Sara Cortés-Amador, Elena Muñoz-Gómez, Sara Mollà-Casanova, Lucia Gimeno-Mallench, Javier Chrivella-Garrido, Pilar Serra-Añó,
Effects of a low-pressure hyperbaric oxygen therapy on psychological constructs related to pain and quality of life in women with fibromyalgia: A randomized clinical trial,
Medicina Clínica, 2024, ISSN 0025-7753, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.medcli.2023.12.016.
(https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0025775324000332)
Abstract
Background and objectives
Self-reported psychological variables related to pain have been posited as the major contributors to the quality of life of fibromyalgia (FM) women and should be considered when implementing therapeutic strategies among this population. The aim of this study was to explore the effect of low-pressure hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) on psychological constructs related to pain (i.e., pain catastrophism, pain acceptance, pain inflexibility, mental defeat) and quality of life in women with FM.
Conclusions
HBOT is effective at improving the psychological constructs related to pain (i.e. pain catastrophism, pain acceptance, pain flexibility, mental defeat) and quality of life among women with FM.
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El-Shewy KM, Kunbaz A, Gad MM, Al-Husseini MJ, Saad AM, Sammour YM, Abdel-Daim MM. Hyperbaric oxygen and aerobic exercise in the long-term treatment of fibromyalgia: A narrative review. Biomed Pharmacother. 2019 Jan;109:629-638. doi: 10.1016/j.biopha.2018.10.157. Epub 2018 Nov 3. PMID: 30399600.
Abstract
Chronic pain is one of the most common clinical presentations in the primary care settings. In the US, Fibromyalgia (FM) affects about 1-3% of adults and commonly occurs in adults between the ages of 40-50 years. FM causes widespread muscular pain and tenderness with hyperalgesia and allodynia and may be associated with other somatic complaints. Hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) has been utilized and has recently shown promising effects in the management of FM and other chronic pain disorders. In HBOT, the intermittent breathing of 100% oxygen in a pressurized chamber where the pressure is higher than 1 atmosphere absolute (ATA) has been utilized. HBOT exhibits a significant anti-inflammatory effect through reducing production of glial cells and inflammatory mediators which results in pain alleviation in different chronic pain conditions. HBOT can also influence neuroplasticity and affects the mitochondrial mechanisms resulting in functional brain changes. In addition to that, HBOT stimulates nitric oxide (NO) synthesis which helps in alleviating hyperalgesia and NO-dependent release of endogenous opioids which seemed to be the primary HBOT mechanism of antinociception. Moreover, aerobic exercise and meditative movement therapies (MMT) have gained attention for their role in pain alleviation through different anti-inflammatory and antioxidant mechanisms. In this review, we aim to elucidate the different mechanisms of HBOT and aerobic exercise in attenuating pain as adjuvant therapy in the multidisciplinary treatment strategy of chronic pain, and more particularly fibromyalgia.
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