My daughter Bridget is a twin who was delivered full term. Bridget was diagnosed with Global Developmental Delays at 4-months-old after experiencing infantile spasms. She had been developing slowly up until that point, but while experiencing infantile spasms her development came to a halt. Her brother Michael has never skipped a beat and to this day, he develops slightly ahead of most normal milestones. Of course, the doctors initially pointed a rather gloomy prognosis for Bridget, but would never commit too much.

Over the years, Bridget was given the traditional OT, PT, and speech therapies weekly. We ventured out to several alternative therapies such as cranial sacral, vitamins, piracetam, amino acids and lastly hyperbaric oxygen treatments.

We noticed a difference after 9 HBOT treatments! We began them over the Christmas holiday (break) and did not tell the school district. When Bridget returned to school, all of her teachers and therapists asked what I did to her over the holidays. Her physical strength improved (able to walk holding our hands rather then just in her walker), her social skills improved (she interacted with the other children rather then just focusing on her aid and teacher), and her oral motor skills improved (lots more sounds, better biting and chewing, whistling and blowing).

Throughout the 60 treatments, other improvements were apparent. She actually watched TV where she never had the attention span before. She grew toenails, where she barely had any; she sleeps on her tummy, which she could never do before because her respiration could not take it. Bridget’s physical movements and transitions continuously improved. She showed food preferences for the first time ever and gained a strong love of music and dancing. She learned many new signs, and tried to hold my hand.

I could go on and on, but the main point is that Bridget has shown some beautiful improvements while undergoing HBOT and most importantly, has not lost these skills. These changes may have occurred eventually without treatment, but we will never know that for sure...also, these skills were so significantly delayed and were holding up all of her progress that it was time to accelerate anything we could. These may appear to be small gains to most moms, but to us they meant the world. We celebrate and appreciate all gains!

Bridget is currently undergoing a second course of amino acid treatment and we plan on having her receive more HBOT after the treatment is over. Fortunately, Bridget never experienced any problems with her ears in the tank. Although she cried the first 10 treatments or so, she began to enjoy them as long as she had her videos! She went in by herself for all of those treatments. I also think the treatments last winter helped with her immune system, as we had no illnesses during that time and her school was full of viruses!

I wish the best for all of our children and hope that this information can help.