Evaluation of Clinical Biofeedback


Book Description

This comprehensive survey will be useful for anyone who seriously wants to learn more about the current therapeutic status of biofeedback-therapists, physicians considering a referral, well-educated prospective patients, teachers, students, and research workers. But readers with different needs should use it in different ways. For a quick overview of a large field, one should tum to the Introduction and Summary and Conclusions sections. The reader interested in a specific disease should look for the proper section in the Table of Contents and then tum to the overall summary at the end of that section and also the briefer summaries that are given in the last paragraph of many subsections, whenever sufficient data are available. The reader who wants more information should read the entire chapter. The serious student or research worker, for whom the book will be most valuable, will want to read more of the main volume and at least to sample the Appendix to see the kinds of information that can be mined from it. When patients are satisfied with a new treatment and seem to be improved by it, why bother with any additional evaluation? The reason is that history has shown over and over again that new forms of treatment initially can be used enthusiastically for many conditions with apparent success, only to have the pendulum swing in the opposite direction from overenthusiasm to com plete disillusionment.




Mind/Body Integration


Book Description

Biofeedback training is a research methodology and training procedure through which people can learn voluntary control over their internal physiological systems. It is a merger of mUltiple disciplines with interest deriving from many sources-from basic understanding of psychophysiology to a desire for enhanced self-awareness. The goals of biofeedback are to develop an increased awareness of relevant internal physiological functions, to establish control over these functions, to generalize control from an experimental or clinical setting to everyday life, and to focus attention on mind/body integration. Biofeedback is explored in many different settings. In the university, biofeed back equipment and applications can be found in the departments of experi mental and clinical psychology, counseling, physiology, biology, education, and the theater arts, as well as in the health service (student infirmary). Outside the university, biofeedback may be found in different departments of hospitals (such as physical medicine), private clinics, education and self-awareness groups, psychotherapy practices, and elsewhere. Its growth is still expanding, and excite ment is still rising as a result of biofeedback's demonstration that autonomic functions can be brought under voluntary control and that the long-standing arti ficial separation between mind, body, and consciousness can be disproven.




American Journal of Clinical Biofeedback


Book Description

Issues for summer 1978- contain abstracts of the Proceedings for the Annual Meeting of the American Association of Biofeedback Clinicians.




Biofeedback


Book Description




Stress and Tension Control


Book Description

"Tension" is an internationally recognized word. Its omnI presence in our public media--in our newspapers, on TV, in magazines, and on radio--as well as in our everyday conversations indicate that we are well aware of the problems of over-tenseness. Pulp news papers and magazines increase their sales with promises of quick relief for tension problems. Business executives complain at the end of the day of being "uptight", and often accept a hotel chain's invitation to "unwind" at their bar. Soap operas attract large audiences, in part capitalizing on tension problems--irritable ar guments between husband_ and wife seem interminable! Indeed, the entire world is aware of the need to control ten sions. Such widespread needs invite varied "solutions", with the most attractive appearing ones offering promises of quick and easy cures. The market for tension reduction has been exploited in numer ous ingenious ways for centuries but I think never more than today. People with serious tension disorders often eagerly seize promises of easy relief, regardless of cost. Those who suffer headaches, spastic colon, essential hypertension, back pains, phobias and general anxiety are especially sensitized to tension disorders and potential cures. The American Association for the Advancement of Tension Control is dedicated to the elimination of tension problems through a two pronged attack: through the immediate technological application of tension control principles that now exist, and by encouraging scientific research to further develop our methods.







Biofeedback


Book Description

The chapters of this book were prepared as task force reports under the aegis of the Biofeedback Society of America (BSA). The impetus for the present generation of task force reports can be dated back to 1982, when John D. Rugh, as President-Elect of the Society, announced that the updating of the task force reports would be given high priority during his term as President. An ad hoc Task Force Committee was appointed in 1983, and the committee set the following objectives: (1) solicit a widely based stream of input from all segments of the Biofeedback Society of America, (2) establish a peer review system to assure the highest degree of scholarship and an unbiased approach, (3) select for area authors only individuals who have profound knowledge of the area and who have demonstrated the ability to extend understanding by reviewing and criticizing the literature, (4) prepare all reports according to a standard ized format, and (5) publish all the reports simultaneously. Input came from several sources. Many people responded with ideas and suggestions to an announcement in the BSA Newsletter that the task force reports were being revised. In 1984, a symposium was conducted at the BSA annual meeting, which included round table dis cussions and dialogues between task force report authors and the BSA membership.