Hyperbarics

Northeast Oklahoma Wound Care Center
Tahlequah City Hospital added Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy (HBOT) to its list of services in late 2007. This treatment helps patients suffering with wounds that will not heal, a much needed service for many patients in and around Cherokee County.
Hyperbaric oxygen therapy refers to constant treatment of the entire body with 100 percent oxygen at greater than normal atmospheric pressures. Normally, the average human takes in 20 percent oxygen and 80 percent nitrogen. With HBOT, the patient is put in a chamber that completely immerses the body in 100 percent oxygen. This increased pressure and oxygen dissolves oxygen in the blood and in all body tissues and fluids at up to 20 times normal concentration. 
It is currently known that hyperbaric oxygen therapy:
• greatly increases oxygen concentration in all body tissues;
• stimulates the growth of new blood vessels to locations with reduced circulation;
• causes a rebound in arterial dilation after HBOT. Often, post treatment blood vessel diameter is greater than pre-treatment diameters improving blood flow to compromised organs;
• stimulates an adaptive increase in Super Oxide Dismutase, one of the body’s principal, internally produced antioxidants and free radical scavengers. Super Oxide Dismutase greatly aids the treatment of infection by enhancing white blood cell action and increasing the potency of germ-killing antibiotics.

Treatment through HBOT is Medicare approved.