About Interactive Light Therapy

Anxiety and brain injuries created by events like a stroke or fall can cause EEG brain waves to slow down. Significant brain-wave slowdown can cause you to have difficulty sleeping. The condition can also cause you to become depressed, irritable or confused, or feel physically tired. It is as if the brain becomes caught in a cycle of repetitious negative or unwanted thoughts and emotions that gain strength with each rotation. Interactive light therapy helps break the negative cycle by restoring the brain's integrating function.

EEG Slowing

• During interactive light therapy, light brightness is adjusted at a rate that is comfortable for the client. The adjustment is significant enough over time to allow the client's brain to easily integrate the slower brain waves with more normal brain-wave frequencies. Bits of flashing light are used in the therapy. The work weakens or diminishes the slow brain-wave frequency, which interrupts negative thought and emotion cycles. There are interactive light therapies that combine psychotherapy with the light to achieve enhanced results.

Biofeedback

• EEG-driven stimulation, or EDS, is a non-invasive biofeedback form. As an offshoot of the study of psychophysiology, EDS studies a client's neurological, behavioral and emotional response to light therapy. Clients are generally asked to sit in a chair or on a sofa with dark glasses on. Tiny lights attached to the glasses are flashed for as long as the client can comfortably endure.

Effects and Length

• Depending on the nature of the injury or the emotional state of the client, light therapy might continue for several weeks or months. Clients who are sensitive to the flashing lights might be in therapy longer as the practitioner will set the duration of the sessions for as long as the client is comfortable. Some clients are effectively treated in as little as five sessions. Five years of studying interactive light therapy results reveals that of more than 350 people treated in a therapy trial, 97 percent of them showed marked improvement.

Considerations

• Improved integrated brain-wave function improves your ability to learn, receive insights and react with increased patience and understanding. Milder forms of light therapy include using full-spectrum lights for 30 to 40 minutes a day. Clients can lie down or sit nearby a full-spectrum light to gain relief from seasonal affective disorder, or SAD. The lights are also referred to as sun boxes and can be purchased from home repair stores like Home Depot or from pharmacy stores like Walgreens for about $20.

Benefits

• Interactive light therapy has helped relieve clients of tension headaches and control hypertension and regulate heartbeat. For some conditions like seizures, light therapy might be combined with regular monitoring of brain waves by using electroencephalographs, or EEGs. People suffering from chronic fatigue, chemical addictions and trauma can benefit from interactive light therapy administered by a trained professional.