[00:00:19.890] - Candi Broeffle, Host

Good morning. And welcome to Green Tea Conversations.

 

[00:00:22.220] - Candi Broeffle, Host

The radio show that delves into the pages of Natural Awakenings magazine to bring you the local experts who share their progressive ideas and the latest information and insights needed so you can lead your best life. I'm your host, Candi Broeffle, publisher the Twin Cities edition of Natural Awakenings magazine. And I am honored to bring these experts to you. Today on our show. We welcome back, Guy Odishaw, a bioelectric medicine practitioner and the owner of Bhakti Wellness Center in Edina.

 

[00:00:50.230] 

Guy, you were just with us about five weeks ago, and you were sharing with us about a new venture that you have with Dr. Richard Sinda called the Minnesota Brain Health Clinic. And, today you're going to come to us and we're going to talk about bioelectric medicine. But before we do that, I'm going to ask you to just share with us a little bit about who you are, your background and share with us what the Bhakti Wellness Center is.

 

[00:01:16.900] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

Good to be back with you, Candi. Thank you for the invite. So my background. I've been practicing in Holistic Health for about 30 years. I started off as a massage therapist, then moved into teaching massage, then hired by the University of Minnesota to set up an integrated clinic there, worked at the University of Minnesota for about eight years in the Integrative clinic. There left U of M to start Bhakti  as an attempt really to take the integrative program that we had pioneered at the University and to see how it would do is kind of a standalone model as a standalone clinic.

 

[00:01:52.930] 

That was the beginning of Bhakti's like 16 years ago. And now here we are. We got to pre pandemic. And we were the largest integrative clinic in Minnesota. The pandemic took a little wind out of our sales. We shrunk a little bit, but that's fine. We've concentrated the essence and we're smaller and more potent than ever. And I'm enjoying actually running a smaller operation. Bhakti  is an integrative wellness center in Edina. And I work in the clinic as a practitioner, doing integrated manual, therapies bioelectric medicine, neuroimaging and neurofeedback.

 

[00:02:33.640] 

That's kind of my mainstay of my practice right now. I would say my clinical focus is treatment resistant, chronic pain trauma and specifically, traumatic brain injury and then moving into the effects of psychoemotional trauma or traumatic brain injury on mental health. So that's kind of the mainstay of my practice currently.

 

[00:03:00.670] - Candi Broeffle, Host

And we're really excited because you're going to be back with us kind of every month for the next couple of months talking about the different therapies that you do practice at the Bhakti Wellness Center. And today, though, we get to dive in deep to that bioelectric medicine. So why don't you give us kind of an overview of what bioelectric medicine is?

 

[00:03:25.210] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

Most folks are not familiar with the term bioelectric medicine. It's been coined relatively recent recently. The research goes back easily. You can go back 100 years and see research on this. You can go back further. But if we stay in somewhat relatively modern scientific time, we have about 100 years of research, and it's very encompassing in terms of what falls under this umbrella term of bioelectric medicine. So it could be using just straight, like electricity, like what you find running through the circuits of your house. Electricity like that all the way down to on a molecular level where they're using molecular biology chemicals to alter electric signals at the level of an ion channel on an individual cell.

 

[00:04:21.700] 

So even there, they're altering electric properties of the cell to change function. So spans from the gross electric force that we're all used to powering our lives all the way down to that cellular level and a tiny little single ion changing an ion gate on a cell. So we have a massive area of research and application covered under this term. The most exciting thing to me in recent times has been GlaxoSmithKline and Google partnering to form a bioelectric research and a device company already just a few years Candi, they have done some amazing research and produced some amazing devices that are having outcomes that were unimaginable ten years ago.

 

[00:05:12.650] - Candi Broeffle, Host

So that's a really interesting partnership. So what is it that they're bringing together? How are they developing some of the different technologies that they have?

 

[00:05:23.160] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

Sure. So as you can imagine, those two companies? One, you have a lot of money. You have a lot of know how in both sides of Smith Klein Glaxo, on the pharmaceutical side, the knowledge about human physiology, but the know how to do research. And on the other side, you have Google with the technology side. It's the perfect coming together of areas of specialty to make something happen. And again, to be able to financially fund it so that it doesn't move at a snail's pace. And that's exactly what happened when they were able to put the kind of money behind it and move through conceptual trials, animal trials and into human trials at a rapid pace and be able to take somebody, for example, with osteoarthritis, do a small implantable vagal nerve stimulator something the size of a pencil eraser and be able to take this initial study twelve people and have positive outcomes across the board, but a few outliers that had essentially complete resolution of their osteoarthritis normalizing of joints and not just pain reduction, but a return to an active life.

 

[00:06:39.330] 

Absolutely. Again, not believed to be possible until done and demonstrated that it could be done. The theory was there, but they just hadn't been able to get the technology to match up with the theory of the molecular biology of how you could drive the system. But they were able to do that. And again, that's why I think we're going to see the most helpful changes in devices come out of that side of the industry because of their ability to research and deploy.

 

[00:07:14.590] - Candi Broeffle, Host

Yeah. And you said this has been in just the last couple of years.

 

[00:07:19.150] 

Yeah, obviously, again building on decades of research. But it hit this critical point where there was enough kind of small pilot studies, enough indications that there was a bear there. There was something that big business decided to get in on it. Otherwise, it's again been done for decades. But in really small startups, single clinician, single researcher pilot study with one or two people done in a very simple way. So that's really the history of it. And even on the clinic side, right. That's been the clinical side of it.

 

[00:07:58.420] 

But with big Pharma and big tech getting into it, we're just seeing them do what they do is move the whole thing faster and come to market with products that are safe and effective and affordable.

 

[00:08:12.070] - Candi Broeffle, Host

I find it so interesting because anytime that there is a change or a new technology that comes in or something that is completely known by so few people, they always say it takes 10%, right, 10% of the population. And once you hit that 10% of people knowing about it, that's where it starts to take off. And so it's interesting to think about that. If we've had hundreds of years of this research, 100 years of using this technology, less than 10% of the population knew about it. But once it hits that critical mass, then you get all the rest of that support behind you.

 

[00:08:54.820] 

So having big technology come in to see how it's going to go from there is going to be exciting to see. So can you explain to us a little bit about how that works with the osteoarthritis? I'm just curious, as far as what is it that's happening in the body that is causing kind of a reduction in their pain.

 

[00:09:19.030] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

So the primary thing they're influencing is the vagus nerve, and that is a lever into the autonomic nervous system. The autonomic nervous system is running pretty much everything from the neck down. So all of our organs and our primary functions are being regulated by the autonomic nervous system. If you have a system, that is what we say sympathetically biased. So two activated the sympathetic nervous system or think of it as kind of our fight-flight side, if the sympathetic nervous system is engaged more than is healthy, what you see is things like inflammatory conditions, autoimmune diseases.

 

[00:10:07.210] 

Once they present symptomatically, they get a diagnosis of that. But a person might have had years, decades of being subclinical where their physiology just wasn't optimal and was again, a little too much inflammation. And that's what you have in your arthritis is essentially inflammation and where it shows up in the exact nature of it is what gives it a different name. But the process is quite similar. So what they're doing is by regulating the autonomic nervous system and bringing up parasympathetic or the relaxation response, you're counterbalancing that inflammatory tendency of the system.

 

[00:10:46.870] 

So one you're just tamping down inflammation, but you're also bringing up the rest and rejuvenate side. So the healing side of the body, it's a win win, less of the deterioration, more of the healing. And the outcome is seeing something like osteoarthritis being profoundly changed by something as simple as regulating the vagus nerve.

 

[00:11:07.660] - Candi Broeffle, Host

We have to go into a break right now. But when we come back, we're going to continue our conversation with Guy and learn more about bioelectric medicine. To learn more about the Bhakti Wellness Center and to make an appointment, visit BhaktiClinic.com or call (612) 859-7709. Again. That number is (612) 859-7709. To read the online version of Natural Awakenings Magazine, visit NaturalTwinCities.com You're listening to  Green Tea Conversations on  AM950, the Progressive Voice of Minnesota. And we will be right back.

 

[00:11:58.490] 

Welcome back to Green Tea Conversations. Where we delve into the pages of Natural Awakenings magazine and talk to the professionals who share their expertise on natural health with you. I'm your host, Candi Broeffle. And today we're talking with Guy Odishaw, a bioelectric medicine practitioner and the owner of Bhakti Wellness Center in Edina. So just before the break, you were starting to help us understand kind of the history of bioelectric medicine and what is happening when it's starting to happen now, as it's being taken on by big Pharma and big tech companies in order to see where this can be developed.

 

[00:12:35.040] 

But I'm curious, how are you actually using this at the clinic? What types of things are you doing at the clinic? I know that you actually have something called the frequency specific microcurrent.

 

[00:12:48.290] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

That's one of our more popular technologies that we use. It's a form of microcurrent therapy, and it's been around for decades with a fantastic body of research behind it. But frequency specific is a particular type of like, a paradigm, a school of thought. Most microcurrent uses one frequency at a time. The frequency specific uses two. That's the big differentiating point differentiates the equipment from others, but a way to think about it the way we actually those of us who practice for specific microcurrent, think about it is kind of think about Pharmaceuticals and electrocytacles as roughly these two equivalents.

 

[00:13:28.500] 

And we like to think that by using microcurrent therapy by using frequencies and waveforms and amperage the different changeable parts of the electroceutical that we can do things that sound very similar to what Pharmaceuticals are doing right. The ability to change the biochemistry of the body by an exogenous force by putting something in so it could be you take an anti-inflammatory and that down regulates part of the immune system and gives an anti-inflammatory effect. Or we could use microcurrent therapy to deliver a specific frequency pair waveform intensity and have a very similar effect of dampening down a part of the immune system related to inflammation and have an anti-inflammatory effect using microcurrent.

 

[00:14:18.030] 

Those are two really good equivalents of how one might choose one over the other.

 

[00:14:23.270] - Candi Broeffle, Host

We never question when a doctor recommends for us to take Tylenol to reduce inflammation or Advil for pain or any of that other type of stuff. We just do it right. We think it's going to work. So we do it if they're doing the same thing or basically having the same result, why don't we know more about this? Why aren't we being told about this?

 

[00:14:45.660] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

Excellent question. And one that I ask myself every day in the clinic and in part because clients ask me every day in the clinic. And so it's a lot of what you said earlier, kind of that, say, 10% tipping point. This hasn't become the norm. Right. We can go back in history and look at a time when bioelectric medicine and Pharmaceuticals were roughly neck and neck. Then you can see where Pharmaceuticals just leapt forward. And part of that was just efficacy. Right. Like they moved forward faster, their ability to create change in a way that was simple and predictable.

 

[00:15:21.580] 

And available. And so they pulled ahead. It was like a beta VHS thing, right. We always say Beta was better than VHS, but VHS one. There's a reference that only a select number.

 

[00:15:35.750] - Candi Broeffle, Host

I was going to say for anyone under the age of 35, you may not know what that is. What either of those are.

 

[00:15:44.090] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

We could talk about DVDs versus MP3's  versus streaming. Yes. So we had a point in time in history where these two things were neck and neck and the Pharmaceuticals pulled ahead. And then we all know kind of what happened with Pharmaceuticals. You have big Pharma and all of the things that we could say about that kind of the pro Con list. But certainly one of the things they've done is they've occupied medicine at the level of medical education, at the level of practice. The fact that pharmaceutical reps are far too often in a doctor's office providing medical counsel on how to treat with Pharmaceuticals.

 

[00:16:23.710] 

Well, there is no electrostutical rep that is going and knocking on the doctor's door to try and sell them a product or get them to promote their product because there just isn't an industry there at that level, right?

 

[00:16:37.230] - Candi Broeffle, Host

Yes.

 

[00:16:37.680] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

So we have multiple, multiple systemic reasons for why don't the average healthcare consumer know about this? They could know about it, right. In a moment with Google, we all have Google now. They could be experts. But if you don't know to go and look at it. And if you don't know to go look at it and then look at the research, you go to the Library of Congress and you will find hundreds of thousands of research articles and white papers on this. It is not a hidden thing.

 

[00:17:08.450] 

People just aren't looking for it because they don't know to go look for it. But if they did, they would find it. And then the same thing on the doctor side or clinician side, it has to be a doctor. It could be a psychologist who could be recommending transcranial stimulation instead of an antidepressant. There's great research to show that the transcranial stimulation is two to three times more effective with no side effect than the entire class of antidepressants. So we would just say, why isn't it being recommended?

 

[00:17:42.490] 

And it's simply because practitioners don't know about it. Why don't they know about it? The education they received didn't include it. Why? Because training medical education is usually a good 20 years behind. And these are the reasons why they're just systemic reasons, no particular nefarious reasons, or that these modalities don't work and they're somehow alternative and lumped in with whatever we want to call the alternative, right? I mean, how far out on the limb do we want to go? It's just not in the average person's purview to encounter them.

 

[00:18:19.200] 

And so that's why aren't they for those reasons. But as we talked about with big Pharma coming in, that's what's changing. That's what's exciting. I mean, we've never seen a growth in the bioelectric marketplace like we are right now. It's exploding. And there's so much more to come.

 

[00:18:38.130] - Candi Broeffle, Host

And it is exciting. In our lifetime, you and I are close to the same age, I imagine. But in our lifetime, chiropractic was seen as really right. That was being something that was just completely out there when I was young. And now it's very common for a doctor to tell a patient to go see a chiropractor as part of their treatment plan and acupuncture as well. Even though that's been around for thousands of years in the US, it was not seen as something that was legit. Where now it's very legit.

 

[00:19:10.410] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

Yes. Absolutely. Candi, appreciate you mentioning those because you talk about that 10% thing. Right. Well, chiropractic is at about 5% of the population utilizes chiropractic care. 5% of the population utilizes chiropractic care. So we can say that chiropractic hasn't even reached that tipping point yet.

 

[00:19:29.800] - Candi Broeffle, Host

No, that is so interesting, isn't it, though?

 

[00:19:33.460] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

That is an astounding statistic. And so we have to think, like, if chiropractic in which is pretty pervasive. Right.

 

[00:19:40.530] - Candi Broeffle, Host

Right.

 

[00:19:41.020] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

Then bioelectric medicine has to be at 0.5%. So that's why it's just obscure. But it's only obscure because it's obscure. It's not obscure because it doesn't work or because there's research. There are mountains of research to support what we do in the clinic. And how we use bielectric medicine.

 

[00:20:05.550] - Candi Broeffle, Host

Well, guys, we're going to go into another break right now to learn more about the Baking Wellness Center. Candi to make an appointment, visit BhaktiClinic. Com and that's B-H-A-K-T-I clinic.com or call (612) 859-7709. Again, that number is (612) 859-7709. To read the online version of Natural Awakenings, visit NaturalTwinCities.Com You can find a podcast of this show on AM950radio.com, on Apple and Google podcasts. And anywhere you get your podcast. You're listening to Green Tea Conversations on AM950, The Progressive Voice of Minnesota. And we will be right back.

 

[00:20:57.190] - Candi Broeffle, Host

Welcome back to Green Tea Conversations. Where we delve into the pages of Natural Awakening magazine and talk to the professionals to share their expertise on natural health with you. I'm your host, Candi Broeffle. And today we're visiting with Guy Odishaw, a bioelectric medicine practitioner and the owner of the Bhakti Wellness Center in Edina. So just before the break, we have been talking about the research and some of the different aspects of bioelectric medicine. And so now I thought it might be a good idea to start talking about some of the different bioelectric medicine devices that you use at the Bhakti Wellness Center and kind of how they're used what they're used for.

 

[00:21:36.020] 

And maybe you can even share some of your client results or examples of the results that you're getting for your clients. We're going to start with some of we're going to kind of run through a list of them, but one of them that we want to talk about, that's really highly effective that you use a lot as well is called the photobiomodulation or light therapy, and we're going to get into that in our next segment. So we're going to devote our whole fourth segment to that particular therapy.

 

[00:22:03.550] 

But for now, let's go back and I'm going to ask you to once again kind of give us an idea of what the frequency specific microcurrent is, how it's used and what type of clients you might use that with.

 

[00:22:17.240] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

Sure. So I'll say a little bit about the program itself. So we do the biological medicine in the clinic. So book an appointment, come in and see a practitioner and receive a treatment. So that's one of the ways that we deliver the modalities. The next is we rent the devices so a client might come in, have a session or two in the clinic, learn their treatment plan, how to work the device, And then they're sent home with it so that they can do daily treatments at home.

 

[00:22:48.270] 

We also do most of our renting programs are rent to own. So if a person is finding that they're having good success with the device and the modality, they can just keep renting it until they own it. And of course, we also have just a person could purchase it. Right. So you can think of the rent to own as like a payment plan.

 

[00:23:07.090] - Candi Broeffle, Host

That's really generous. So that's generous of the center to do that for people. It gives them the opportunity to try it without making a huge investment all at once. But still knowing that they're working towards that, should they want to keep it?

 

[00:23:20.910] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

Absolutely. I was trying to remove the barriers to care, and the cost of purchasing a device can be a barrier to care. Now, some of these devices aren't that expensive, but some of them can be quite expensive. But either way, any one individual is wherever they're at in their ability to afford and invest in their health care. And what we want to do is try and make the money side of it is minimally restrictive as possible. So that's where our rent to own rent program. The other side of it, though, is a person might be able to afford it.

 

[00:23:53.160] 

It might even be an effective treatment for them, but there just isn't compliance. They're just not going to use it. Right. And so for that person, I'd actually rather that they don't buy a device. I don't want these devices to be today's Nordic track that people just hang their laundry on to drive. Right?

 

[00:24:13.840] - Candi Broeffle, Host

I was going to say, like every one of my gym memberships.

 

[00:24:17.290] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

Yeah. For me, it's really about matching the person in the device and the protocol and seeing that it's effective, but also that they're going to use it. And then that person. Great. We've got a match in all of those categories in a way they go. Otherwise, I really like to see none of my devices that live out their life stuffed in the sock drawer and aren't used. Right. So that's part of the goal of the program is just taking all of that into account. It's not about selling devices, it's about helping people have positive outcomes with minimal financial investment, minimal side effects and optimizing the outcome.

 

[00:24:58.990] 

How can we put all of those things together? And bioelectric medicine offers us a lot of resources in this way. So frequency specific microcurrent again, think of it like the pharmacy. We have thousands of frequency pairs that we can put together, Candi, hundreds of protocols to treat all kinds of things. I have a client that has had, unfortunately, multiple health challenges, a couple of bouts with cancer, the need for a couple of surgeries along the way and then just injuries that happen, living a normal life.

 

[00:25:32.030] 

This is the person that ended up buying a device, and it has served her well in that life, keeps offering her challenges. So being used for diagnosis of breast cancer. So using it to support her nervous system because of the stress of that support her immune system because of the stress of that support her through chemo and radiation, then through the surgery and recovery from the surgery and then just restoring her health after going through all of that, the same device was able to serve her at every step.

 

[00:26:07.810] 

Some of the outcomes were it just didn't take her down as bad as it could have absent this as a self-care care modality at home. Right. Her scars are almost invisible. It's truly amazing how well she healed virtually no pain medication during the whole process. Posts surgery. She took pain medication once. Otherwise she didn't have pain. And again, that's the microcurrent. And then again on the not just kind of fighting a condition but actually promoting health. She came out of this. Just a happier, healthier, more vital person than before the diagnosis, right.

 

[00:26:52.690] 

This has been an amazing circumstance in which the frequency specific microcurrent has really been a great support for this patient.

 

[00:27:01.570] - Candi Broeffle, Host

Say, she comes back to you and she finds out she needs to have her knee replaced. So then she can use the same device. You change up the protocol, you teach her how to use it for that particular ailment, and then that supports her through that journey as well.

 

[00:27:19.600] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

Correct. Exactly. And then there are things just in mundane things like bronchitis or a cold or those kinds of things that we all encounter. We have protocols for those as well. Right. And often people struggle with sinus infections and they end up taking a Sudafed or something. But then that impacts their sleep and the stability of their nervous system. There's an option to treat a sinus infection with the frequency specific microcurrent works very well.

 

[00:27:52.090] - Candi Broeffle, Host

So that device can be used for all types of health Ailments and can support them throughout their life.

 

[00:27:59.410] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

Absolutely. Talk about it like it's the old-fashioned doctor's black bag. It's the black bag. My family just laughs at me because I literally carry one of these devices with me all the time. And somebody will have like, oh, I have a whatever. And I'm like microcurrent.

 

[00:28:19.790] - Candi Broeffle, Host

No, you can do microcurrent on the fly. Well, let's get into another type of device that you use, which is called the audiovisual entrainment or AVE.

 

[00:28:30.750] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

Yes, AVE one of my favorite devices, probably the one that we use the most in the clinic. So it's an odd little device. It has glasses with flashing lights and headset with binaural beats and then ear clips with transcranial electric stimulation. So all three modalities in one device, they can be used independently. They Candi be all used at the same time. They can mix and match. This is a brilliant design device, affordable at $600. You get that much technology in such an affordable device. Love it.

 

[00:29:08.930] 

What we use it for is primarily to regulate the central nervous system, the brain and the central nervous system. But since the brain and central nervous system kind of run everything. Whether you talk about temperature regulation, hormones, sleep, digestion, not just cognition, what people often associate brain and mind, the brain is running everything. So the more we can use the Ave to regulate the brain, the more we can improve health. We use it for anxiety, depression. We might use it for chronic pain, somebody who's had a concussion, a traumatic episode, PTSD.

 

[00:29:53.750] 

There's just so many things we use it a lot in the Bredeson protocol, the program instead of Brain Health Clinic. Last show we did we use it for our folks with mild cognitive decline. Very versatile device.

 

[00:30:08.630] - Candi Broeffle, Host

Very good. And then another one that you have that we'll be talking about more in depth, too. And then upcoming show is Neurofeedback and Neuro stimulation?

 

[00:30:18.490] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

Sure. So this is one of our high end. Again, we could do a whole show or three shows on this. Right. This is a high-end Cadillac intervention. But in other words, it's a simple operant conditioning brain-computer interface where the brain learns how to rewire itself. And we can optimize the wiring in our brain for function. And it is absolutely amazing life-changing process to go through a course of neurofeedback. And with neural feedback, the benefits don't end when your neurofeedback ends. That's the thing I always tell my clients.

 

[00:31:00.710] 

Like, when was the last time you took driving lessons? Probably when you were 15. But you're a better driver now than you were then. Hopefully, same thing with neural feedback, you do your course of neuro feedback. You optimize the wiring in your brain, how your brain functions. It will continue to optimize over the course of your life so that it's an investment in a future, better brain that keeps getting better over time.

 

[00:31:29.790] - Candi Broeffle, Host

So this goes beyond treating the symptom. You're actually changing.

 

[00:31:34.770] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

Yes. In many cases, we're changing where the Dysregulation is coming from. So that the thing that was causing the downstream problem is in itself has been changed, optimized regulated. And then again, the ripple effects are far and wide. When people do neuro feedback, it doesn't change my command because I have anxiety. It doesn't just change their anxiety. It will touch all aspects of their life, their work life will get better, their relationships will get better. And again, why? Because the brain is the interface for all of those things.

 

[00:32:16.720] - Candi Broeffle, Host

Okay.

 

[00:32:17.690] - Candi Broeffle, Host

And then the final one. And we're going to do this one a little bit quick. Just kind of touch on it is Muse.

 

[00:32:24.040] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

Yes, the Muse. So Muse. We use primarily as an at home sleep study device. So it's a personal EEG tracker. Brainwave tracker, which allows us to do a pretty sophisticated sleep study. And we know sleep is so important to our health. So if we can help a client get their sleep under control, that's a major intervention. The other benefit to the Muse is because it does EEG or brainwave tracking. A person can do a fairly sophisticated neural feedback at home with that device. So it's a pretty potent little device.

 

[00:33:02.320] 

But again, our main use is around sleep studies, so we can understand people's sleep patterns and help bring a better intervention. If there's sleep issues,

 

[00:33:11.790] - Candi Broeffle, Host

That is fascinating.

 

[00:33:13.490] - Candi Broeffle, Host

Well, we are going to go into a break right now, and when we come back, we're going to continue our conversation with Guy, and we're going to get into the photo bio-modulation. So to learn more about the Bhakti Wellness Center and to make an appointment, visit BhaktiClinic.com. And again, that's B-H-A-K-T-I clinic.com or call (612) 857-7709. To read the online version of Natural Awakenings magazine, visit NaturalTwinCities.com You can find a podcast of this show on AM950Radio.com on Apple and Google podcast.

 

[00:33:52.170] 

And anywhere you get your podcast, you're listening to Green Green Green Tea Conversations on  AM950, The Progressive Voice of Minnesota. And we will be right back.

 

[00:34:12.130] - Candi Broeffle, Host

Welcome back to Green Tea Conversations. Where we delve into the pages of Natural Awakenings magazine and talk to the professionals who share their expertise on natural health with you. I'm your host, Candi Broeffle. And today we're talking with Guy Odishaw, a bioelectric medicine practitioner and the owner of the Bhakti Wellness Center in Edina. So we are coming back. We are talking all things bioelectric medicine today. So now we're going to talk about one of the devices that you use, which is the  photobio-modulation device, which is kind of the newest addition to your services.

 

[00:34:45.640] 

So tell us about PDM.

 

[00:34:48.140] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

So photobio-modulation, also known as light therapy or low level light therapy, and historically, laser therapy, both the advent of LEDs really opened up light therapy to a much broader market. Obviously, they're safer, they're less expensive, which means devices are more affordable. And so you see what you see now, where if you go on Amazon and type in, say, red light therapy, you will find thousands of devices. This is the explosion because they're so cheap to make now and again and safe that combination. But the problem is, of course, on the health care consumer side, there are thousands of devices, and they clients all the time.

 

[00:35:29.150] 

Like, I don't know which one to buy. This is really how I got into it. As far as I did, I was using light therapy in the clinic, but it was a little more in the background, mixed in with everything else we do. And it came out when needed. But it was really the number of questions from clients coming up and saying, hey, can you help me pick a device that got me into it? And, really understanding what was happening in the device market. And if there's one thing that I would like to be able to communicate to the listeners today, it's this if you're thinking about trying some  photobio-modulation, some light therapy.

 

[00:36:01.610] 

Number one, yes, you should. Two, some guidance around choosing a device. And so number one, if you're reading somebody's information or you're listening to a talk and they're saying we have a patented wave formula or our waveform is unique and only delivers these benefits. First of all, just stop listening to them right there, because that is a lie that is marketing. That is them trying to get you to buy their device and not somebody else's, because it just isn't true. Right now, it is true that the frequency of the light matters.

 

[00:36:35.600] 

I want to talk a little bit about the science here. I won't go too far. But the entire electromagnetic spectrum is all what we're talking about today, whether it's electricity, there's physical electricity that runs through a wire or it's electromagnetic electricity that runs in the form of, say, light. There's all the visible light. And then there's the invisible light, no microwaves. There's radio waves. Those are all the same thing from this perspective. So if we talk about light, there's research showing what does Orange do? What does yellow do?

 

[00:37:05.150] 

What does green do? And Orange represents a spectrum. There isn't just Orange. There's different individual wavelengths that are measured in what's called nanometers. So different nanometers of light. And then in the body, there's what's called a chromophore, which is what is it absorbed by in the body. So these are the two things that matter starting off at the high level is you need to know what's the chromophore that absorbs, what nanometer of light. That's what gets you in the ballpark of what does this light affect?

 

[00:37:36.850] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

And then you start looking at from there what exact frequency of light, where in the body is that? The deeper the thing I want to get to certain lights can't penetrate that deep. Only other lights can. And then you have to look at your power and your time. These are all the things that make up delivering  photobio-modulation is you need to know what you're trying to affect. Where is it in the body? What color light do I need? How much power do I need behind that light?

 

[00:38:03.220] 

And how much time to get a meaningful dose. Right. So a medicinal dose that actually changes the system the way you want. And so that's a lot to understand. That is a very complicated science. So it makes sense to me when somebody goes on Amazon and they're looking up a blue light for acne, but they have no way to know if that light is actually going to be effective for them, because you need to know all of these things. And generally, the person selling their device on Amazon, or it could be anywhere, eBay or just on a website, they aren't putting that technical information in front of the person.

 

[00:38:39.180] 

So even if the person knew, you can't get the information from the seller. And this is the problem. The device might be great, or it might be a complete waste of money. And you don't know unless you have this information. And that's what I tell my clients sort through. I spend way too much time digging through the technical specs of devices to find out this information so that I can say yes, that's a legitimate device. And that's a good price. Or yes, that's a legitimate device.

 

[00:39:05.070] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

But it's five times more than it needs to be all of that. So having gotten into that level, I started to bring more into the clinic so that I could just say, yes, this device, for this reason, this meets the standards, you will get a dose from this device. That was really what got me into having products in the clinic and available online. But then that also led me to using it more. So what we primarily use is red and near infrared light. Okay, red and near infrared light do roughly the same thing.

 

[00:39:38.570] 

Red is visible. Near infrared is invisible, but they're chromophores. So what absorbs them in the body is very similar. The difference is penetration. Red light will go a few millimeters and near infrared will go a few inches into the body. So if you have a deep structure, if you want to affect your hip joint, red light not going to touch it. You could do red light all day long will not help your hips. You can't get there. You want to do aesthetics like facial aesthetics. Red light?

 

[00:40:06.590] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

Absolutely. Because you're literally wanting to affect the first few millimeters of your skin. Perfect. If you want to go deep into the hip joint, you need near infrared, and then you need near infrared with a certain amount of power behind it to push through all of that tissue to get to that joint. So this is primarily what we use in the clinic. Is this red, near-infrared?

 

[00:40:27.380] - Candi Broeffle, Host

Is this the same device. Or are they different devices?

 

[00:40:30.970] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

So you can kind of mix and match. We now have some devices designed for us for specific uses, but we also just buy off the marketplace. So mixing and matching for the need of the client. And what are we trying to do? We pick the device that matches and it's going to get us the best result. Whether that's treating them in the clinic or if we're going to get into that kind of rent to own thing for the home treatment, which is ideally right.

 

[00:40:56.570] 

The way to think about light therapy is to think about it like exercise or nutrition. Can you get a lot of benefit from one treatment depending on what you're treating? Yes. If you're treating pain, we can essentially turn off a nerve that's conducting pain with 200 milliwatt dose of infrared light. So we can do that so great for pain. But if you're doing aesthetics, well, you're going to continue to age over your life course. So having something that is an address to that is really an everyday thing.

 

[00:41:26.430] 

So I like to encourage my clients to think about this as like nutrition or exercise, something you're going to engage in to promote health rather than fight a disease. And that's what light therapy does. Light therapy drives the vital forces of the body. It stimulates the basic metabolic functions of life of vitality. And then that vitality is what corrects the course of disease. We don't really fight diseases, right? You stimulate health, stimulate the immune system, and then the benefits come from that. So it's a different mindset

 

[00:42:00.800] 

And again, what we often think of as disease care. Light therapy is really health care.

 

[00:42:05.330] - Candi Broeffle, Host

Well, guys, thank you so much for being with us today. I really want to encourage people if you're looking at a natural approach to pain management. Candi natural approach to almost anything that is ailing you at this point. Contact the Bhakti Wellness Center and to see if Bioelectric Medicine is the right fit for you Guy. Thank you so much again for being with us today. It has been a pleasure to have you in the studio.

 

[00:42:30.820] - Guy Odishaw, Guest

Thank you, Candi It's been great to be with you

 

[00:42:33.080] - Candi Broeffle, Host

And for people who want to learn more about the Bhakti Wellness Center and to make an appointment, visit BhaktiClinic.com or call (612) 859-7709. To read the online version of Natural Awakenings Magazine, visit NaturalTwinCities.com. You're listening to Green Tea Conversations on AM950 The Progressive Voice of Minnesota and I am wishing for you a lovely day.