Drowning victim treated with 40 hyperbaric chamber sessions
In 2017, a very interesting case study was published concerning little Eden, a drowning victim. The child, then aged 2, was quickly treated using a hyperbaric chamber . In a few weeks, most of the damage suffered by her brain was reversed. Since the parents have well documented this terrible ordeal, you will find in this article some videos allowing you to see Eden's progress.
Drowning, a summer scourge among children
According to the National Public Health Agency , a total of 1,983 drownings occurred in France between June 1 and August 31, 2021. Accidental drownings followed by death were more frequent in swimming pools among children under 6 years old.
This is unfortunately the case for little Eden, who drowned in 2016. After evading the security systems, the child drowned in the family pool. She was found by her mother 15 minutes later, in cardiac arrest and submerged in water at 5°C. Her pupils were dilated and her body temperature was 28.9°C.
After nearly 2 hours of cardiopulmonary resuscitation, she was able to be revived by the medical team at Arkansas Children's Hospital.
A few days later, medical imaging showed damage to the brain: a thalamic lesion and generalized cerebral atrophy, with a significant loss of gray and white matter volumes.
Reversing the damage of drowning with the hyperbaric chamber
After a 5-week hospital stay, little Elen returned home with severe neurological after-effects. Subsequently, her parents contacted Dr. Paul Harch, the author of this case study. He offered them a 2-step therapy.
Normobaric oxygen therapy
Since the family could not move immediately, the doctor asked them to set up normobaric oxygen therapy. Using a nasal cannula, the little patient breathes pure oxygen, every day for a few minutes.
" Within hours, the patient was more alert, awake and stopped squirming ," Dr. Harch says in his case study.
You can see this in this short video, where we see Eden upon leaving the hospital, and then a few days later after the introduction of normobaric oxygen therapy:
Hyperbaric oxygen therapy using a hyperbaric chamber
Then, once the family was able to travel to join Dr. Harch in New Orleans, little Eden benefited from hyperbaric oxygen therapy .
So, 11 weeks after the accident, the child began his sessions in a hyperbaric chamber .
- After 10 sessions, the mother indicates that the patient is " almost normal, except for gross motor skills ."
- After 39 sessions, the doctor reports that " the patient presented: assisted gait, speech level higher than before drowning, near normal motor function, normal cognition, improvement in nearly all neurological examination abnormalities, cessation of all medications (buspar, propranolol, baclofen) and residual emotional, gait and temperament deficits. "
In the video below, we can see little Eden before and after the 40 sessions in the hyperbaric chamber:
Back home, the courageous patient has learned to walk again:
Conclusion
Following the 40 sessions in the hyperbaric chamber, new brain imaging scans are carried out:
- The MRI on the left corresponds to 3 days after the drowning.
- The middle one corresponds to 31 days after drowning. There was a loss of 12.3% of brain tissue, seen as an increase in white color on the scan (white is cerebrospinal fluid).
- The right MRI was done 27 days after the 40 sessions in the hyperbaric chamber. That's 162 days after the drowning. This is normally the time when you see near-maximum brain tissue loss. Instead, Eden had a 13.9% increase in brain tissue.
Finally, Dr. Harch concludes his case study as follows:
" Short-term normobaric oxygen therapy and hyperbaric oxygen therapy in the subacute phase of drowning recovery resulted in near-complete resolution, documented by video, of severe neurological deficits and near-complete reversal of gray and white matter atrophy on MRI.
Hyperoxic and hyperbaric gene signaling-induced growth of gray and white matter is the most likely explanation. "
Warning : Keep in mind that this is a case study, conducted on 1 child. It does not carry the same weight as a scientific study conducted on many people. The goal of this article is to show you that hyperbaric oxygen therapy could be a powerful tool to induce neuroplasticity following drowning.
How does a session in a hyperbaric chamber take place?
Below, I offer you a short video to show you concretely the course of a session (which is also called " diving ") in a hyperbaric chamber. Subtitles are available for the hearing impaired.