Alternative therapy
Research Papers
Can the Brain be Trained? Comparing the Literature on the Use of EEG Biofeedback/Neurofeedback as an Alternative or Complementary Therapy for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
Psychologists, social workers, and school counselors are increasingly adding neurofeedback (NFT), a controversial alternative or complementary therapy to their treatment plans for patients with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. NFT involves training the patient in self-regulation of brain wave patterns, employing a standard diagnostic tool, the EEG, in an interactive operant conditioning mode not often used by neurologists or psychiatrists. Some NFT therapists claim in their books that they have sufficient expertise to advise parents against the use of Ritalin™ and amphetamines, which are part of the conventional multimodal therapy strongly endorsed in a wide variety of clinical publications. In return, some of the leading conventional physicians and Ph.D. researchers in the field of ADHD have traditionally ignored or disparaged the literature of NFT as being insufficiently scientific and appearing largely in obscure journals or books published outside the mainstream medical presses. While most librarians are unlikely to have sufficient scientific or clinical credentials to pass judgment, one way or another, on NFT as a treatment for ADHD, an examination of the credentials of authors, their books, book reviews, journals, and the publishers in which opponents and proponents make their case is entirely within our purview, and such an analysis is provided.
View Full Paper →Neurofeedback and epilepsy
Over the past three decades, researchers have examined various behavioral approaches to the treatment of epilepsy. One prominent line of inquiry concerns the effectiveness of neurofeedback, which entails the entrainment of specific electroencephalographic frequencies for the purpose of decreasing seizure frequencies in patients with epilepsy. This article reviews the current literature on the efficacy of neurofeedback in reducing seizure frequency. While it is clear that neurofeedback had a positive effect in most of the studies reviewed, these findings are limited due to multiple confounding factors. In the absence of any rigorously controlled studies, the relationship between neurofeedback and seizure frequency cannot be firmly established. Despite these limitations, the promising role of neurofeedback as a treatment for epilepsy is illustrated.
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