Tonight, new data shows that one
and every five people who've had
COVID-19 is still suffering from
lingering symptoms, a phenomenon
more commonly known as long COVID.
As doctors try to identify the cause,
one Florida medical clinic is
having success with treatments using
hyperbaric chambers old technology,
but with a new scientific protocol that
pushes the human body to fix itself.
You're watching 10 Tampa Bay at 6.
I'm Carolina Lee.
And I'm Dave Wagner, 10. Tampa Bay's
Eric Glasser explains how it works.
I didn't know what was happening to me.
For two years. I wasn't really aware of
where I was in time and space. Yeah, Danielle
Gillen was living the nightmare.
Short term memory loss,
getting lost in my House of long COVID.
It was hard for me to walk.
It was hard for me to talk.
I stuttered. I couldn't see
Gillian. Symptoms got so bad she
went to an emergency room thinking
she was having a heart attack.
It's there. We learned about the
Avive clinic in the villages.
If it weren't for that, like for
this complete process, I don't know.
The clinic is one of three in the
world using multi patient hyperbaric
chambers to treat long COVID with a
specialized protocol that regulates
oxygen levels to help the body fix itself.
By doing this protocol we can actually
trigger new neuronal stem cell growth,
new brain cells. And more importantly,
we have the technology to measure it.
Doctor Mohamed El Amir,
who heads the Aviv clinic,
explains how it works.
And now we're going into
the temporal lobes. First,
by looking at images of the brain,
they can determine which areas
have been affected by long COVID.
So we can actually see hate this part
of the frontal lobe, for example,
that got hit by the virus.
It is not functioning as well.
And if parts of your brain
aren't functioning as well,
that could lead to brain fog or
memory problems, attention issues,
processing speed and slowing.
So we have objective ways to now
measure that and with all of our
patients we're able to do that.
Patients are then given a series of targeted
brain exercises to perform during their
treatment in the hyperbaric Chamber,
40 sessions over the course of two months.
Patient number one could
have memory exercises.
Patient #2 can have attention exercises.
Patient #3 you might have
issues with processing speed,
so they'll do games to really help
improve it and trigger those parts
of the brain that need the help.
While I'm playing that Brady HQ,
my brain saying feed me, feed me,
feed me, and then you're slowly
but surely rebuilding all those
neurological connections.
What happens in the hyperbaric
Chamber then takes advantage
of a scientific breakthrough that garnered
the Nobel Prize for Physiology in 2019.
That is the key to this protocol.
In 2019, the Nobel Prize was awarded for
a molecule called hypoxia induced factor,
and this factor gets released
when the body senses a low oxygen.
Because in low oxygen the cells,
the body knows my cells will die,
so I need to replace them.
I need to make new stem cells.
I need to grow new blood vessels
to help usher blood to the
organs that might be starving
during the treatment.
Pressure in the hyperbaric chamber
is increased by two atmospheres.
Patients inside breathe an air
mixture with oxygen levels
17 times higher than normal.
They then remove their masks at specific
intervals to breathe normal air,
but that sudden fluctuation fools.
The brain into thinking it's suffocating.
That, a pair of studies showed triggers
something called neurogenesis,
a defense mechanism that spurs the
production of new vessels and stem cells.
The body has amazing
ways to help heal itself,
but we need to convince it to do it.
And to trigger it, we need to trick it,
thinking it's in a low oxygen
state to go into a repair mode.
It's all over.
Those customized brain exercises
then help the body direct that new
cell growth where it's needed. Most
this is huge. This is.
The future we want to address
the causes of diseases,
not just treating symptoms.
So we have the technology to do that.
And what better way but to use
the body's own mechanisms to heal
and regenerate its own cells.
And I think the biggest thing
was my quality of life overall.
That's improved substantially for
long COVID patients like Danielle,
it's been life changing for sure. Brain
scans show areas that had been
damaged are functioning again.
I'm not just recovering now,
I'm rebuilding. And, like,
it's like the best place to be.
She's regained her memory, her mobility.
But most importantly, she says,
her children have their mom back.
Experiencing their loss was the
greatest loss and now all my wins.
Around what we get to do
together and things that we
have planned for the future.
It's like I'm ready. What
better than making your own
body have its own stem cells?
And they'll go to the area of need.
This is the future, to repair everything.
Really fascinating story there.
Currently, the hyperbaric treatments
are not covered by insurance
and the whole procedure can cost
10s of thousands of dollars.
But the Aviv Clinic says it does work
with people who think they could benefit.
Meanwhile, they continue to publish results
and findings with the goal of getting the
procedure covered by insurance plans.
These same hyperbaric chambers are also
being used to treat people who have suffered
traumatic brain injuries and strokes.