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Biofeedback Therapy

Biofeedback therapy is the process of learning to regulate your autonomic nervous system and somatic nervous system. These nervous systems are involved in the body’s stress and relaxation response and muscle movements. When your system is dysregulated, you may experience symptoms like muscle tension and muscle pain, irregular breathing, causing panic-like symptoms, anxiety, chronic fatigue, and irritable bowel syndrome. Biofeedback can help you develop techniques to alter your physiological activity and improve your health and well-being.

What Is Biofeedback Therapy?

Biofeedback therapy is the process of learning to change your physiological activity for the purpose of increasing self-regulation and decreasing mental and physical symptoms. Your heart rate, breath rate, finger temperature, skin conductance, and muscle tension are recorded and analyzed in real-time by a computer-based program. Through sounds or visual graphs, you learn to change your physiological activity and alleviate symptoms.

HOW IT WORKS

How Biofeedback Therapy Works

Precise, non-invasive instruments measure physiological activity, such as heart rate, breathing, muscle activity, skin conductance (sweating), and skin temperature. These physiological processes are measured by sensors placed on your skin and body. You will immediately receive auditory (music or tones) or visual feedback (graphs, pacers, and video) based on what is monitored. You learn to adjust your activity through operant conditioning and positive reinforcement. Using this visual and auditory feedback, you learn to increase your nervous system’s flexibility and adaptability. Over time, these changes can endure without further feedback sessions.

For example, people with muscle tension will see a graph with a green light when they meet their goal (decrease in muscle tension). The light turns red if muscle tension increases. This feedback signals you to relax your muscles. Over time, you increase your awareness of muscle tension and relax your muscles automatically, and the feedback is no longer needed.

At Hills Neuroscience, we select the types of biofeedback training that are best for you based on your stress profile, muscle assessment, clinical interview, and symptoms.

How Biofeedback Therapy Helps

Biofeedback therapy can help you alleviate unwanted symptoms, decrease the severity of medical conditions, and achieve peak performance. Through biofeedback training, you’ll learn to control your breathing, muscle tension, body temperature, and skin conductance. You learn to increase your heart rate variability, a measure of psychological and physical health. As a result, you’ll gain relief from troublesome symptoms like panic attacks, depression, headaches, and abdominal pain and learn to function optimally. Repeated training can get you to a place where you no longer need instruments to reinforce healthy responses and behaviors.

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