Episode 309: Healing with Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy
Today I welcome two special healers, Drs. Jason and Melissa Sonners. This power duo are co-owners of a holistic chiropractic and health facility in northern new Jersey called Core Therapies. They are also the parents of 3 amazing children, and are truly living it to lead it as some of HCFs top platinum doctors. They are here today to discuss Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy (otherwise known as HBOT), and will share their mission around this amazing healing modality that they implement in their practice, as well as in their own lives.
More about Drs. Jason and Melissa Sonners
Dr. Jason Sonners, DC, DIBAK, DCBCN, CCWP and Dr. Melissa Sonners, DC, DACCP, CACCP are co-owners of Core Therapies Family Wellness Center in Northern New Jersey, a holistic center with eight chiropractors whose specialties include functional neurology, functional medicine, pre/post-partum, pediatric and sports injuries. Core Therapies also offers acupuncture, massage, infrared, sauna, spinal decompression, yoga and laser therapies.
Drs. Jason and Melissa Sonners are also the owners of NJ HBOT and HBOT USA.
Show notes:
Jason Sonners' book: Oxygen Under Pressure
Visit the Sonners' HBOT website
Dr. Pompa's Beyond Fasting book. Newly released!
Transcript:
Dr. Pompa:
Have you heard of Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy, HBOT, as it’s known? This show is about it. I’ll tell you; we talk about a lot of different conditions that this could be a breakthrough. Look, when you lack oxygen into tissues and cells, they will not heal. Your body has the ability to heal those issues, but unless we can bring that intelligence into those tissues, healing will not occur.
Angiogenesis, bringing oxygen into tissues, Lyme disease, pathogens, all of that we talk about on this episode of Cell TV, so stay tuned. Oh, and by the way, these are two of my amazing platinum doctors. They, in fact, have a Health Center of the Future. This is a show you’re definitely going to want to share because there’s an answer here. As we see so many neurodegenerative conditions, autism, pain-related conditions, this is part of the answer. Stay tuned for this episode of Cell TV.
Ashley Smith:
Hello, everyone. Welcome to Cellular Healing TV. I’m Ashley Smith. Today, we welcome two special healers, Drs. Jason and Melissa Sonners. This power duo are co-owners of a holistic chiropractic and health facility in northern New Jersey called Core Therapies. They’re also the parents of three amazing children and are truly living it to lead it as some of HCF’s top platinum doctors.
They are here today to discuss hyperbaric oxygen therapy otherwise known as HBOT. We’ll share their mission around this amazing healing modality that they implement in their practice, as well as in their own lives. Let’s get started and welcome Dr. Jason, Dr. Melissa, and of course, Dr. Pompa. Welcome, all of you.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
Thank you.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
Thanks, Ashley.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
Thanks for having us.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
That was such a nice intro; thank you.
Dr. Pompa:
It was a nice intro: healers, powerful duo there.
Ashley Smith:
I meant all of it; they’re lovely people. We’re excited.
Dr. Pompa:
Yeah, we may even be blessed by one of those little angels she talked about popping up.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
Yeah, they’re somewhere.
Dr. Pompa:
There’s a little angel over there you told me, so if we’re blessed by that. We get blessed by my dogs every once a while, just uproar, so who knows. Never disrupt Cellular TV.
I love this topic, oxygen therapy, whether it’s Ozone, but oxygen, because when people start to not feel well, one thing across the board is that they’re lacking cellular oxygen in some aspect, hypoperfusion. As a matter of fact, we even do the toxicity test where we’re looking at a visual contrast test. The reason people fail, toxic people fail that, is because of hypoperfusion; meaning, lack of oxygen to the nerve. The one nerve we can measure is the optic nerve. Obviously, there’s a lot of reasons for that.
Oxygen therapies have been around a long time and have really progressed. Let’s start there. What the heck are we talking about HBOT, hyperbaric oxygen therapy? Let’s keep it very simple. What does that mean, guys?
Dr. Jason Sonners:
Yeah, exactly what you said, oxygen is just a very fundamental—I look at it as a nutrient. It’s just a very fundamental nutrient every cell in our body requires to just function normally let alone to heal if there’s some issue. There’s multiple different ways to deliver oxygen whether it’s just sitting here like we are breathing having this conversation. We could talk about some of the others like Ozone, or EWOT, and then there’s hyperbaric.
Just very specifically and super basic, hyperbaric literally means increased pressure. You’re basically placed in a hyperbaric chamber which is a pressurized environment. As a result of that pressure, it creates an increased gradient. Then that allows us to absorb higher amounts of oxygen as a result of being inside that pressure.
Dr. Pompa:
Maybe it’s worth explaining why people would lack oxygen in the cell and the nerve before we even get into more of why this is so helpful and what it does for different conditions. We get that, but let’s start there. Why is this occurring in so many people?
Dr. Jason Sonners:
The amount of conditions is virtually endless. It’s all about microcirculation. In order for us to get oxygen under normal physiology, oxygen is carried in the red blood cell. Our red blood cells are virtually 100% saturated or close to it. Then as long as we can get red blood cells into a capillary, which is microcirculation and that allows that gas exchange, we can get oxygen to whatever tissue we’re trying to get it to.
Dr. Pompa:
Yeah, but why does so many people even without being diagnosed have this problem of lacking the oxygen getting into their capillary, getting into their cells. What do you think’s going on there?
Dr. Jason Sonners:
Literally, with every type of you name it, toxicity, mild trauma whether it’s physical trauma, TBI, concussion, improper nutrient density, you name it, Step One, there’s a chronic inflammation cascade that we talk about a lot when we’re doing lectures. The beginning of that cascade starts with tissue damage which is ultimately again from all these different sources, but as soon as there’s tissue damage, there is microcirculation damage. As soon as there’s microcirculation damage, the ability to deliver oxygen to the cell or to actually pull waste products away from the cell becomes hindered. To me, that’s a lot of where the beginning of that chronic inflammatory process begins.
Dr. Pompa:
Yeah, it’s true.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
There’s also the two different ways to look at it. We’re not just using it for a lack of oxygen situation; we’re also using it as Jason mentioned and as you brought up for the powerful effects it has as far as inflammation, detoxification, mold toxicity, Lyme, a lot of the stuff that you cover on your Cellular TV. Those are powerful benefits of the therapy as well.
Dr. Pompa:
I was just literally reading an article this morning, today. It’s about Alzheimer’s and dementia, which is affecting—my gosh, it’s scary when you really look at these numbers. The article was really focused on the fact that this amyloid plaque theory has been disproven, and yet, there’s so many billions of dollars behind it in medications, etc., that they’re not letting go of it. There’s a very powerful group that still is pushing that literally failed theory. The real theory is exactly what we’re talking about: microcirculation problems, oxygen decrease to certain parts of the brain; therefore, that’s why you see the results you do with this hyperbaric oxygen therapy.
It works so well because the real issue is there’s certain traumas caused by toxins, other like you said nutrients, whatever, a lack of blood flow, tissue damage, greater lack of blood flow, and now that can lead to inflammation and the real cause of Alzheimer’s and dementia. I think that many people watching this, the first sign is simply brain fog. That’s why when they do this therapy, they go, oh my gosh, it’s like I can think. We really just improved that capillary and that oxygen flow into the brain. What other conditions are you seeing that like, hey look, this is a gamechanger for?
Dr. Jason Sonners:
A lot.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
Yeah, we see a lot. In our clinic in New Jersey, we see a lot of autism because autism is just really prevalent here. We see a lot of people for—
Dr. Pompa:
There you go; I knew the queen would arise.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
—for toxicity challenges.
Dr. Pompa:
Did you see what she just did? She just showed her—that’s hilarious. That’s so funny. Okay, I shouldn’t egg her own. Okay, I’m sorry. I didn’t want to interrupt you; I just can’t help myself. Go ahead.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
We see a lot of people dealing with Lyme also just being in the Northeast, a lot of people that have brain fog, chronic fatigue, inflammatory pain-based conditions, fibromyalgia, concussions. We see a lot of concussions. We see a lot of a variety of things.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
[00:08:59] also for various reasons, patients that are undergoing or are in different phases of cancer treatment of some kind. There’s a very broad base. Again, it’s not that—hyperbaric gets almost a bad name because people say well, you can’t have one thing that cures so many different conditions. That’s not what it is; it’s not doing that at all; it’s not curing any of it. It’s like we started this conversation saying that underneath so many of these chronic illnesses is a different type of damage to microcirculation leading to inability to nurse the cell properly leading to further damage, further chronic inflammation. If we could just break that pattern, actually get that healing to occur, that’s where it has an impact on so many different conditions, not because you’re curing the condition but because you’re getting to the underlying cause of the conditions.
Dr. Pompa:
Yeah, through circulation, the innate intelligence in our body knows how to heal. Your point, this doesn’t heal or cure anything, but if we can increase circulation to an area, now, we’re bringing in, of course, an increase in blood flow but also white blood cells, also things that really drive healing that are needed. Once the body’s innate intelligence can recognize that via increased circulation, now it can start bringing in stem cells. It can start bringing in everything that it needs for healing. The body’s ultimately doing the curing and healing. That’s why to your point; that’s why we can talk about this one thing is helping so many conditions without sounding like a “snake oil salesman.”
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
Yeah, and that’s part of why we have so much passion around it. It’s so congruent with our philosophy and our belief in the power of the body as you believe. The body can self-heal and self-generate, but we’re just giving the body extra amounts of what it needs, the fuel sources similar to fasting. We’re just helping you tap into our natural potential and the body does the rest.
Dr. Pompa:
It’s so simple. Now, you all are platinum doctors that are on our team of cellular detox docs. The platinum is that level that you’re very trained in all of the things that we’re so passionate about: obviously cellular detox, fasting, fasting strategies. Now, what have you seen this—because I talk about Health Centers of the Future, which is the name of my seminar organization that trains these concepts. Now, what have you seen but with the cellular detox, the fasting the strategies, and this HBOT therapy? Your clinics in New Jersey, this is a Health Center of the Future when you’re pulling all these things together.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
Yeah, it’s again something we talk about a lot when we’re doing some workshops and lectures. Every one of those therapies is great. If you’re doing metabolic therapies like diet variation and fasting, if you’re—and that’s just all your doing, you’re going to get some amazing results. If you’re doing really powerful and appropriate detoxification programs, you’re going to get results. If you’re doing hyperbaric, you’re going to get great results.
It’s just so different when you bring them together that the synergy of these—one of the things because when we’re lecture to medical doctors and we’re talking about it and we want to say well, in research, we have to control all the variables. We can only change one thing at a time and make sure that this is having the effect. Sometimes, I think from a research standpoint, that has a place and it’s appropriate to do, but in the clinical environment, if you’re addressing the singular therapies one at a time—how many times I’ve had somebody come in, well, I tried gluten-free for a month. That didn’t work so I put it back. Then I was dairy-free for a month and that didn’t work so I put it back. Then I did this detox program but that had some [00:12:54].
You had to do all of it and you had to do all of it for some period of time to really nourish the system enough to actually get the changes you’re looking for. I’m amazed honestly in the last few years especially having brought in a lot of the different techniques that we go through in our groups to see the synergy of all those pieces come together for people. There’s nothing like it.
Dr. Pompa:
Yeah, and that’s the whole point of the Health Center of the Future. It’s like this multitherapeutic approach that I’ve been teaching for 20 years. It’s our passion; it really is.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
I think what’s a big part of it for us too is anytime you’re doing a powerful, really effective, safe detox, you’re still going to sometimes get some kickbacks and some reactions. For a lot of people, we slow it down. We know how to do that through the group and our coaching, but also using certain tools in Health Centers of the Future like hyperbaric oxygen has made a lot of difference because it can help just minimize that detox reaction.
Dr. Pompa:
Listen, obviously, you know this. I’ve encouraged every one of our platinum doctors to have one of these units in their office. Let’s talk about what it looks like. Do you have one near you that you can spin the camera around? Some people have no idea what we’re talking about, honestly. I want to give them a visual if you have one.
Hold up a picture, anything, whatever you have available to you. Then you can start talking about the actual process. What does it look like when we talk about doing this? How long does somebody have to be in there? What’s going on? When they see this device, they’re like what is going on?
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
Yeah, we can definitely. Jason’s looking for a picture right now. We’re in our whole office.
Dr. Pompa:
I should have prepared you for that.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
Yeah, it’s okay. Our stuff’s not right here, the hyperbaric machine, but we’ll make sure you guys have pictures in the postings and things like that. Essentially, for this purpose, we’ll talk about soft chamber. There’s soft chamber and there’s hard chamber. A lot of people that are seeking hyperbaric for the first time tend to go in what’s called a soft chamber. They’re usually about seven feet long, Jason? Is that the right length?
Dr. Jason Sooners:
Yeah.
Dr. Melissa Sooners:
You lay in this inflatable area. It’s nice and comfortable. It inflates over about five minutes. You feel a little bit of pressure in your ears just like if you’re flying. You just stay ahead of it; you clear them, chew gum, yawn, swallow.
Usually, people stay in there for about an hour. It’s a nice little sensory deprivation for a lot of people, too. There’s some white noise. A lot of people sleep, or read, take a little nap, relax, maybe listen to some music. Yeah, you got a picture?
Dr. Jason Sooners:
I’m not sure if you can see them or not, but that would be one version of a soft chamber.
Dr. Pompa:
Yeah, so that’s about seven feet long to hold your average human.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
Seven feet long, it’s 32 inches wide, so about the width of a typical doorway in your home. A soft chamber looks—I mean a hard chamber looks a little bit more like that. It’s the same length; it’s about seven feet, but it’s 42 inches in diameter.
Dr. Pompa:
The hard chambers, they go higher pressure, therefore, more oxygen. Definitely better used in a professional situation. Now, here’s one that you all sent to Daniel. This is my son. Most people watching knew he broke his back. This I used in one of my PowerPoints to show the different treatments we did to get him healing, remarkably by the way to everyone’s amazement. There he is in the chamber.
I don’t know if you can see that, but that’s him in the chamber. Yeah, so there he is inside there. Anyways, it was such a blessing because we know that increases the healing capacity, really sped up the healing. Thank you for that. I got to see it first hand and experience it first hand myself. It was a real experience I’ll tell you. Go ahead.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
It’s good too I think to mention and like you showed those windows. It’s nice and light in there. I do feel that a handful of people when they hear about hyperbaric oxygen, and they’re curious, and they’re wanting the benefits of it, sometimes we hear people being concerned with claustrophobia. I want to address that because I would never want that to prevent someone from getting—
Dr. Pompa:
I’m actually slightly claustrophobic because on my football team, I was piled up on, everyone piled up on me. Since then, I’ve been claustrophobic. I had no problem with it because right above me was the zipper, you know what I’m saying? Meaning that I could stop and open it up at anytime myself. As long as my brain knew that, I didn’t feel constrained.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
I think that’s the most—exactly right when we show people that one there’s a lot of room in there, two, you have full control. You have windows; you have zippers; you have valves. From the outside, we can control it; from the inside, you can control it. As soon as you know that there’s way that—there’s a way out, you can open the door basically so to speak, it does; it does calm most people’s concerns that way.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
Just like anything, working with a provider that knows that and walks you through in a slow way so that you feel a sense of control and safety. People are totally fine.
Dr. Pompa:
How long do you have to stay in to get a benefit?
Dr. Jason Sonners:
It depends on the goal. I’d say clinically the majority of people do about an hour. There are times when it’s more appropriate like a pre-workout or you want to—in some cases, where you’re doing neuro-rehab where you might want to just increase oxygen to the brain to get through an exercise rehab kind of a thing. You might only do closer to 20 to 40 minutes.
From a typical healing and recovery standpoint, the majority are 60 minutes. Sometimes, if we need a lot, if we need to a lot of sessions over long periods of time, we’ll have patients either do 60 minutes twice a day or even 90 minutes at a time inside the clinic or at home if they’re doing home therapy. It ranges a lot just depending on the goal. God bless.
Dr. Pompa:
I had to sneeze. Anyway, yeah, I think the next question—okay, first of all, hold up your book because we’re asking a lot of questions; I’m asking a lot of questions.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
We’re not prepared.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
It’s not out yet.
Dr. Pompa:
Oh, I thought you had it out.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
Yeah, no, the e-book just came out three days ago, so it is out.
Dr. Pompa:
Give the name to your book because they can start there.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
The name of the book is Oxygen Under Pressure. It is out like I said, the e-book’s out. Then the paperback comes out in about two weeks.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
Yep, so you can go on Amazon now. If you just type in Oxygen Under Pressure, you can go ahead and order the digital version.
Dr. Pompa:
Yeah, okay, great, perfect. Yeah, no, that’s good because I’m sure they’re—you have so much more in there about this topic. I think the other question my viewers are wondering is okay, I want to do this. I want to try this. Where and how do they find out more or how can they find a clinic or somewhere to get one of these units?
Dr. Jason Sonners:
Right now, as powerful as it is and as helpful as it is, there really aren’t that many clinics, unfortunately. There’s still a lot—we still have people who travel easily two—we have our clinic in New Jersey; we have another clinic outside of Philly. Equally distant, it’s about a little over two hours away. People travel equally distant from both of those because that’s literally how far away most clinics actually are.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
That’s part of our mission; we’re trying to get these in more practitioner’s hands and educating them on how to use them. For now, the book is a really good resource for people to understand how it works and why it works and to see if it’s a fit for them. Then from there, if they want to reach out to us, and we make sure all the resources are posted with this PO. We can certainly help find someone that’s reputable and in their area and who’s good and skilled at what they’re going in for.
Dr. Pompa:
Yeah, because there is—the protocol is a big part of it working for people correctly. Having people reach out to you is a great idea because you can point them in the right direction. Jason—
Dr. Jason Sonners:
We typically will; we’ll help depending on what people’s issues are or if it’s a clinic looking to build a business and treat patients around it. We typically will help them develop initial protocols, but also the thought process behind the protocols so that ultimately, they understand why we would recommend this or that or the other for a particular case.
Dr. Pompa:
We do get a lot of doctors that watch this. If they’re interested in putting this in—you’re the guy around the country that does this, so you travel a lot with it. I don’t know if Ashley’s going to put up your contact; I’m sure she will. You can give it now if you want.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
Yeah, the best resources for sure are the website, hbotusa.com. We also have a—
Dr. Pompa:
Hbotusa.com.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
That’s our company name. Then we recently started a YouTube channel with the goal of educating people on hyperbaric, both practitioners and the public. If you just go on YouTube and you search Hbot, so H-B-O-T, space, USA. We post videos on there every Monday and Wednesday. That’s a great place to learn about this as well.
Dr. Pompa:
Yeah, perfect, appreciate that.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
You can email us, too. Just support@hbotusa.com too if you’re looking for a clinic near you, or you want more information on how to get home therapies, or start a clinic, whatever those questions might be around all of this. I get a lot of emails; I’m happy to answer them.
Dr. Pompa:
Yeah, that’s great.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
Like you said, we travel a lot. We have a really fun life, really busy life. As you mentioned, we’ve got three kids. Our office in New Jersey is packed and full and fun. We’re opening clinics and traveling to speak on hyperbaric.
It’s such an important mission to us because the miracles that we see in our office every day are just crazy. Parents that are getting their life back because their kids are getting well again or, Dr. Pompa, as you know, as you went through with your struggles when you get your life back as a parent how that changes your family’s life. It’s a lot of work and it’s fun. We’re so committed to it. We’re pulled to this because of what we see in people’s lives and what’s going on. It’s such a congruent, amazing therapy and just helps the body work better.
Dr. Pompa:
Yeah, no, I love it. Most people learn from stories. Tell your story because you have Lyme. Obviously, for you all to get so into this, it affected your life just like everything we do: pain to purpose. Then even tell some stories just from the clinic that you’ve seen because I think that inspires people the most and gets people to take action.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
Yeah, definitely. It was two years ago I think at this point. Again, we have the three kids. Ky was a year old; we had a four and a six-year-old as well. I got hit hard from nothing to down and out with a neurological form of Lyme. I literally felt like I lost my mind in the midst of a busy practice, and busy parenting, and breastfeeding, and up all night.
I struggled to find my way to our office which is two miles up the road, couldn’t remember our kids' friends’ names that spend a lot of time at our house; literally lost my mind overnight. It was really scary. At the same time, thankfully, we have access to these tools. We had just pretty much started our relationship with you guys as well, so jumped right into ketosis, and fasting, and detox.
The hyperbaric really sped things along. I literally would feel—I felt like I had cobwebs in my brain. I couldn’t connect the dots. I literally felt like someone is vacuuming that out of my brain when I was in there. I really attribute it to me getting my life back for our family very quickly. I’m super passionate about helping people with Lyme especially.
Dr. Pompa:
What are some other conditions and your office stories that changed?
Dr. Jason Sonners:
We started with this 12 years ago. We started because I herniated a disc in my back and had drop foot. Then 18 months later, my back was fine. I was working again, I was treating patients, but I never got the function back in my right foot.
I was at a conference. They had chambers. It looked cool. I had no idea what it did. I got in for 20 minutes, a half-hour, got out, didn’t think much of it. Then all of a sudden about 20 minutes later, I started getting pins and needles in my foot. I was like wow, is that—am I feeling that because of that chamber.
I went back, talked to the guy. I ended up doing about eight hours in the four days that were in Vegas at that time at that conference. I had left there with about 20% recovery in that neuropathy. We bought that chamber because I was like this is the only thing that’s changed my—the neuropathy in all this time.
I was doing a lot of nutrition; I was doing exercise; we were doing chiropractic, all kinds of things to help, but it was stuck. Again, microcirculation damage because the disc and the inflammation. That was a massive recovery there.
Our second patient was my step-father. He had MS. He was diagnosed with a primary progressive MS. We did 40 dives in 40 days. He had massive changes.
Again, in my head, I said, well, I had a neuropathy. It’s a totally different mechanism, but MS is any type of neuropathy, so there must be some connection here. We did that and he had amazing change. He’s got his gate back; he started doing stairs again; he got his balance back. Twelve years later now, had a change to relapsing-remitting because it wasn’t primary progressive. He’s doing great. He still gets around really well.
Our next patient was a stroke patient, eight years post-stroke. All she wanted to do was improve her mobility a little bit, but she started driving again. She couldn’t read because she lost partial vision in her left eye. She was able to read again. It goes on and on. We have kids that say their first words to their parents.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
Kids that have been diagnosed with autism, have had injuries.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
Yeah, so—
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
There was one gentleman, he was one of my favorite guys. He came in. He had a mild stroke as well and had lost his driver’s license and just a sense of independence and control and a big part of his life. He did four sessions. He was so cute. He came in. We have this adorable picture of him jumping with his driver’s license.
It was four sessions. The power of that of getting your life back. I know I keep saying that, but that’s what we hear all the time.
Dr. Pompa:
Yeah, it’s why you’re here obviously. Whatever we’re doing in a clinic, it makes it that much better because we need that innate intelligence reaching those tissues. I’m sure you see great results too with diabetics, diabetic neuropathies, and things that literally won’t heal.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
Right; again, it’s the same thing; it’s damage to the circulation from glucose [00:28:46]. It’s the same as dementia. There’s dementia Type Three diabetes. We have all this vascular damage from blood glucose not being under control properly. Again, if you could restore—there’s a handful of mechanisms that hyperbaric, it just does every time: neovascularization is high on that list. We keep talking about microcirculation damage. The fix for that is to heal the vasculature.
One of the most important long-term benefits of hyperbaric therapy is literally angiogenesis. We have all this damage that’s accumulated over the years to the microcirculation, to an area of trauma, or to our brain, or whatever the case is. As we continue to get these hyperbaric exposures, this extra oxygen, and it stimulates angiogenesis, we literally go back and heal and regrow new blood vessels.
Dr. Pompa:
That’s it; I was going to say that’s what angiogenesis means. It’s not just hey, the therapy is there, but literally, as you do the therapy, you’re growing new vessels. You’re getting a permanent increase in circulation into those tissues, so good point. Explain why it works so well for infections, Lyme being one of them. Really, it can help with Candida. It can help with parasitic infections, pathogens in general. Explain that to people because I think they get the increase in circulation, but how does that translate into a better immune system or at least pathogen killing?
Dr. Jason Sonners:
One mechanism is that a lot of the pathogens are anaerobic. Many pathogens exist in these either very low or no oxygen environments. In fact, they even build these biofilms. We talk about biofilms all the time.
The biofilms protect them from medications or herbs or things like that. The biofilms also help maintain this very low oxygen environment.
One pathway is you’re literally massively increasing the oxygen exposure of your body, which is upregulating the oxygen exposure to these bugs. They just can’t live in that high oxygen environment. That’s one mechanism.
Another mechanism is that—there’s like ten. I go through it in the book. There’s ten different mechanisms by which hyperbaric works every single time a person goes in there. One of those is up-regulation of neutrophil and macrophage activity. A lot of times our immune systems is one of our most metabolically active systems. It requires an enormous amount of energy to continue to maintain, especially these chronic infections.
In order to keep rebuilding this army of white blood cells to help kill these infections, oxygen is a critical piece of fuel for that pathway. In order to keep the number of neutrophils and macrophages up—in chronic infections we often see low numbers of white blood cells. In order to keep those numbers higher and in order to keep the activity of the neutrophil and macrophage very high, that requires an enormous amount of oxygen. By dumping this excess oxygen into the system, we’re able to increase the effectiveness of our white blood cells.
The third way goes back to something similar to the first version, which is our microbiome. Our microbiome is the critical piece of our overall immune system. The majority of the healthy bacteria, the probiotic so to speak, are either aerobic—they require oxygen for function—or they’re at least very oxygen-tolerant. While we’re increasing the oxygen in the entire system, that makes it terribly uncomfortable or almost impossible for certain pathogens to exist.
At the same time it’s actually nourishing the healthy bacteria, the healthy part of the microbiome, so that we can increase the healthy bacteria while we’re decreasing the pathogens so we can create a better balance in terms of bugs. That’s also true of most mycotoxins as well. Whether it’s a Lyme issue or a bacterial issue, even viral, you’re going to see the shifts of oxygen really impacting the overall immune system. With something like Lyme, there’s two pieces; there’s killing the infection, but in so many of these infections there’s all the damage that’s occurred as a result of it. Once we’ve killed the infection, we’re not finished because now we need to continue to have that higher level of oxygen in the system so that we can rebuild whatever the damage was that occurred.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
For the same reason, people are probably starting to hear a lot about hyperbaric oxygen therapy for people that are dealing with cancer. Same thing, a lot of the conventional treatments that are used for cancer destroy the system. What people are finding is they can get by with less of those treatments or if they get to a point where they’re wanting to continue them but their body isn’t handling them well, their body then has the strength and their immune system is stronger so that they can fight them.
Dr. Pompa:
I know it’s used with cancer very successfully. That was one of the questions I actually had. Are there any conditions where it’s not recommended or you shouldn’t do with hyperbaric therapy?
Dr. Jason Sonners:
There are a few chemotherapy drugs that their main side effect is the fact that they’re blowing through a lot of our antioxidant system like SOD, superoxide dismutase. It’s a relative contraindication. You just have to be careful and be aware. With people that are over oxidized, you just have to know that and understand the condition behind it. You might try to rebalance and pre-treat with some antioxidant use to balance some of that oxidation.
The only real absolute contraindication is pneumothorax, a blown lung. In order for you to be in the environment, you just have to be able to equalize the pressure. If you can’t equalize the pressure, you really just can’t be in there. Whether that’s equalization in our ears, you don’t feel pressure in your body. When you’re in an airplane, your ears pop, but you don’t feel the pressure in the cabin.
It’s the same thing. The only place you really feel it is our ears or you could feel a little bit intestinally if there’s some air pockets. If you can’t equalize with your lungs, you would feel it quite a bit in your thoracic cavity. That’s the only reason it’s a contraindication.
Dr. Pompa:
I didn’t feel any of that. Explain the difference when people would need the hard chamber that goes to higher pressures versus the soft chamber being okay. There’s certain conditions where you’d say absolutely hard chamber. I know those are harder to find because there’s a little more complications. Maybe explain the difference and what conditions would be right for each one.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
I would say that soft chambers, the limitation there is it’s less pressure and less oxygen percentage-wise. In the beginning we only had a soft chamber, and we weren’t even adding any oxygen to that. It was literally just compressed air. Those first few stories that I told you about , myself, my stepdad, those were just compressed air. Even that is still about a 30% increase in oxygen.
If you’re about 98% saturated right now with oxygen red blood cell-wise and you had a green tank of oxygen and a mask and you were breathing that, the best you could ever do is go from 98 to 100. Our oxygen carrying capacity is limited to how red blood cells carry oxygen in our body under normal atmospheric conditions. That’s in important piece because when you go into a hyperbaric environment, you’ll feel that 2% in no time. What you’re doing is dissolving oxygen into the plasma. The plasma doesn’t usually hold oxygen. Red blood cells do.
In the environment of pressure, you can dissolve oxygen into the plasma. That’s why you can get such massive increases. In a soft chamber, no extra oxygen, you’re running somewhere between 25 and 30% more oxygen, not 98 to 100, but the equivalent of 127. That alone is pretty remarkable. If you add oxygen to that system or as you get deeper and deeper in pressure, you create a larger gradient, which creates a larger amount of diffused oxygen.
In most cases, even the soft chamber alone, you’ll get there. What you could have done maybe a little faster because you had more pressure or more oxygen, you’re going to end up doing a little slower if you’re limited by pressure. The biggest thing is an acute Lyme condition or a really bad acute infection. Think about it; they’ll use in a hospital hyperbaric for gangrene, a really terrible anaerobic pathogen. Hyperbaric is one of the solutions for something like that, especially if it’s not responding to traditional care.
Same kind of thing; if it’s an acute infection and you’re really trying to have an impact on that infection, higher pressure definitely does a better job faster. Subacute infections like typical mycotoxins or chronic Lyme, if it’s not really that we’re going after the infection as much as the inflammation and the consequences of that infection, usually the soft chamber is enough. The degree of whether you’re going soft or hard chamber has a lot to do with how long you’ve had the condition, how acute the condition is, how severe the condition is, and then how much time we have to correct it or your access to it.
For somebody who can come to our clinic in ten minutes, sometimes it’s just go to the clinic. It’s easier. For somebody who would drive three hours to get to the nearest clinic, do some home therapy at lower pressure, but just do it more frequently so that you can get a similar response. Again, there’s so much variation, that’s why I think it’s really important that people be guided to some degree on how to do it.
I hear all the time I tried hyperbaric and it didn’t work. I did it once a week for a month or two, no change. Depending on the issue, most likely that’s just not going to cut it. You really want to make sure if you’re going after whatever that issue is, to use this tool properly to get the benefit.
Dr. Pompa:
I’m sure you cover that in your book. Melissa, you have something to say. After that, talk about some of the highlights of your book and some of the other things you cover in your book. Go ahead, Melissa.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
About the book and about the pressure, the magic really is in the pressure. At this point you can access oxygen in a number of ways. You can even drink oxygen, which still blows me away. The magic is really in the pressure. That’s why we named the book Oxygen Under Pressure.
You can put on a green tank and get from 98% to 100%. Then it begs the question why would you want to be over 100%? Why do we want the pressure? We like to describe oxygen as a nutrient, similar to something like Vitamin C. We all walk around with pretty much enough Vitamin C. Then sometimes you might want to mega dose to help get over a cold or boost your immune system.
Oxygen is the same thing. A lot of us walk around fine, but there’s times when we might want to give the body just an extra boost to help do what it does naturally. That’s where the pressure becomes important and the influx of oxygen. You can only get that benefit through pressure. That’s a lot in the book too. Jason covers a lot of that.
Why do we need the pressure? What does it do? How does it work from a scientific level for people that want to understand that depth and also just keeping it really simple too for different conditions? How does if work for this? Why is it important?
Dr. Jason Sonners:
Many people think here’s ozone. I love ozone. I think ozone is a fabulous tool, and it has a very particular use. [41:42] is a great tool, and it has a very particular use. Hyperbaric is a great tool; again, particular use.
It’s all about what’s the issue? What’s the goal? How do we put it together? Just because they’re oxygen therapies doesn’t mean they’re working on the same system in the same way. They’re working on different systems in very different ways. In particular, it’s pressure that allows that massive increase in absorption. There’s no other way to get that level of absorption without implementing pressure.
The book is broken into two sections basically. The first half is really about chronic inflammation, chronic illness, the history of America or other industrialized nations too, just the road we’ve all been on where to so many degrees longevity has continued to grow. Centenarians are some of the largest population percentage growth these days. We’re getting this increase in longevity, yet we see quality of life suffering terribly. It goes into that. Why are we even wanting longevity without quality of life?
Dr. Pompa:
I don’t.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
How do we help fill that in? How do we help grow quality of life to match longevity? What are all the implications? What are all the issues in our world that have led us to this chronic inflammatory cycle?
It really breaks a lot of that down. It goes into how those things have created what would be considered an accelerated aging from a biologic standpoint. Even though we have longevity, which is chronologic aging, our biologic aging is much more accelerated than it should be.
Dr. Pompa:
Absolutely, which is so true. Most people’s cellular age, biological age is much more than their actual age, which is sad. There’s technology today like this that it literally doesn’t have to be that way.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
Then I go into what would be considered regeneration? How do we fill that gap? For us, it’s no secret. We use ketosis and fasting and other diet variation because it has a very specific effect on that exact same process. We use red light therapy. We use hyperbaric oxygen. We use detoxification because we live in this world.
When you combine that whole big picture, that’s where stem cells, that’s where that whole therapy is. We list through in the beginning of the second half of the book all the different therapies you should consider and then some resources for how to get those. Then ultimately we transition into the oxygen. You have a great book on fasting. There’s great information on some of these other therapies, and I think there’s just a lack of knowledge, a lack of understanding on hyperbaric.
The whole rest of the second half of the book is really just focused on what role does pressure and pressurized oxygen have on that whole process? What does it mean? How does it work? What’s the science behind it and the research on different conditions that help people?
Dr. Pompa:
It’s awesome.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
It’s such an underutilized and so simply effective therapy. It’s insane. That’s why we’re committed to spreading the word on it.
Dr. Pompa:
I appreciate it. I appreciate you coming on Cell TV. I appreciate you being a health center of the future, which you are, as you just described. We have an answer, don’t we, to what the world needs. We’re not ever putting one thing on. It’s putting it all together is the brilliance that we do
I appreciate you being on that mission with me, that’s for sure. I appreciate you spreading this knowledge. Again, it’s a piece of the puzzle. We look at so many people that don’t feel well, can’t get well because they don’t have enough oxygen at the cellular level, can’t get that innate intelligence into those damaged tissues. This is part of the answer.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
You have to fix the cell to get well.
Dr. Pompa:
I’m so glad you reminded me of that.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
We’re on our third outfit change.
Dr. Pompa:
What does the queen have to say?
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
What do you have to say?
Child:
Bye-bye.
Dr. Pompa:
There you go. We’ll leave it with that. We’ll let her say the good-byes.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
Thanks again.
Dr. Pompa:
I love and appreciate you guys. Thank you so much. Get Jason’s book and make sure you contact them. They gave the information lovingly, so I appreciate you doing that, talking to the people, leading them in the right direction. Thank you all.
Dr. Melissa Sonners:
Thank you. Bye, everybody.
Dr. Jason Sonners:
Thank you so much.
Ashley:
Well, that’s it for this week. We hope you enjoyed today’s episode. We’ll be back next week and every Friday at 10:00 a.m. Eastern. We truly appreciate your support. You can always find us at cellularhealing.tv. Please remember to spread the love by liking, subscribing, giving an iTunes review, or sharing the show with anyone who may benefit from the information heard here. As always, thanks for listening.
