In June, to offset a recent increase in pain, she returned over the weekend to undergo two booster treatments, one Saturday and one Sunday, leaving us pain-free once again.
She and her parent headed back to Virginia immediately so she could return to school on Monday morning to complete her final exams.
Gizzelle’s family was able to lodge at the Ronald McDonald House for children and young adults under the age of 21 at a very affordable rate.
What are Calmare Booster Treatments?
Depending on the severity of the original chronic nerve pain condition–and the length of time the patient has been experiencing neuropathy–periodic booster treatments may be required to combat any return of pain after the initial protocol of 10 treatments.
The length of time between the first course of treatment and any potential need for follow-up boosters can be months or several years.
In more advanced stages of prolonged or severe neuropathy, a single or series of boosters can be extremely useful against an elevation in pain.
Booster treatments can be as few as a single session to as many as 10, which will be mutually determined after a physical examination by our clinical director, Dr. Michael Cooney, in cooperation with the patient/family if the patient is under age 18.
By Dr. Michael Cooney, Clinical Director, Calmare Therapy NJ USA
In 2010, as I obtained the professional training to use the Calmare MC-5A device, I grew more excited about using technology to deliver pain relief to my patients without the need for any prescription drugs.
Nine years later, I’d like to offer an update about the progress we have made helping people reduce or even eliminate treatment- and medication-resistant chronic pain.
Those of us who work in pain management were not surprised to see the eventual explosion of the opioid crisis. My healthcare specialty as a doctor of chiropractic requires using drug-free techniques to minimize and eliminate pain.
Calmare scrambler is a remarkable pain management therapy for several reasons, including the fact that it can be used to combat several types of chronic nerve pain (neuropathy), including chemotherapy treatments (CIPN), Shingles (PHN), diabetes, post-surgical pain and unexplained nerve pain.
How Calmare Can Lessen Severe Pain for CRPS Sufferers
What I did not foresee was the vast community of CRPS sufferers who had tried a myriad of medications, painful procedures, surgeries, treatments– and were still left with debilitating pain.
I’m often asked why scrambler therapy is one treatment that can significantly reduce CRPS pain and physical symptoms:
Allodynia
Skin lesions that will not close/heal
Hair loss
Skin discoloration
After treating more than 1,000 patients, over the past nine years, it is apparent to me that CRPS /RSD is a unique communication between local skin tissue and the pain center of the brain.
How Calmare Therapy Works
The Calmare MC-5A device scrambles this misfiring pain message/signal–which says there is pain—when, in fact, there is not.
After the technology scrambles this misfiring message over a series of daily treatments for a period of two weeks, in most cases, the brain’s misfiring message ceases and pain is eliminated.
Using several small electrodes (think EKG) carefully placed in the region of the injury, the technology sends a mild and painless “no pain” message to the brain through the electrodes.
Essentially, the scrambler machine “overrides” the brain’s confused message and corrects it to the ‘no pain here” message.
Keep in mind, the brain can send this faulty pain message to any region of the body—even a location which never sustained any kind of injury.
There is, in fact, no physiological reason for the pain.
As a comparison, phantom limb pain can result when a person who has undergone an amputation still feels significant pain in the part of the body which has been amputated.
Calmare is a ‘Provider-Dependent’ pain therapy.
Therefore, it is essential to confirm your provider’s expertise
and measurable success treatment your type of neuropathy.
Calmare Clinical Trial Success: Mayo Clinic
Dr. Charles L. Loprinzi, who was interviewed in January 2016 after leading his own successful Calmare clinical trial for the Mayo Clinic, explains,
“TENS (a self-administered tens unit) is thought to work through the gateway theory of temporary pain relief, whereby normal touch sensations blocks pain sensations.
But scrambler therapy, on the other hand, provides ‘no-pain’ electrical information via nerves which have received transmissions of chronic pain information.”
Dr. Loprinzi said that through a process called ‘plasticity,’ the brain is ‘retrained’ and will no longer register a pain sensation in the affected area.
To date, there are at least 20 published reports on scrambler therapy that included results involving close to 1,000 patients in total.
These reports include clinical practice summaries, prospective non-randomized clinical trials and randomized controlled trials, including two trials that sought to double-blind patients and investigators.
With patients’ permission, we regularly share their outcomes on our website. I’d like to share a few of our successful patient outcomes in the past year:
Peter Hinninger – New Jersey, USA
CRPS for 17 Years
For 17 long years, Peter tried every medication and every treatment, including a spinal cord stimulator (neuromodulation or SCS) to lessen his chronic pain.
Still, his pain level hovered around a consistent 7-8 on the Pain Scale.
After the completion of the standard 10-treatment therapy, we both teared up when he realized he was pain-free for the first time in more than a decade.
Peter and his long-time partner co-wrote a bookdetailing his Calmare Therapy treatment experience.
Cara adds a pin to Scotland on the Calmare patient map. (April 2018)
Cara – Scotland
Pediatric CRPS
Young teenager Cara from the UK underwent several therapies and pain management medications to lessen her neuropathy. She was still left in pain throughout much of her body.
Ultimately, her family elected to seek an alternative medicine solution and chose to cross the pond to the U.S. so that Cara could be treated by our Calmare New Jersey team.
I’m delighted to report she sustained a terrific outcome. Best of all, she left smiling with her pain level down to a 1/10.
“When my pain management doctor told me a spinal cord stimulator (SCS) was the final treatment option, I knew I had to take matters into my own hands and reach out to the chronic pain community for a less invasive option,” Tonya explains.
After her routine hand and wrist surgery, the chronic pain started in one hand and soon spread to the other. As the condition worsened, the chronic nerve pain spread to her neck, back and stomach.
Tonya tells her personal story after undergoing Calmare Therapy:
Hope, Fortitude, Tenacity, Sheer Determination
You can read or watch more of our patient stories, most of whom arrived at our clinic bearing the weight of daily pain that made work, school–even socializing or taking a walk in the park–impossible.
They courageously tried invasive pain relief procedures and side-effect-laden painkillers and opioids without success, up to the day they arrived at our clinic.
Not surprisingly, many new patients arrive at our clinic skeptical and dejected.
Who could blame them?
But they all had one key attribute that remained steadfast–regardless of all the treatment disappointments.
Hope.
And we were honored that they mustered the remarkable fortitude to try (one more time) to mitigate their pain and regain their quality of life.
Providing Pain Relief to Children, Teens, Adults and Seniors
Eight years after introducing scrambler therapy to our clinic, I have treated children, teens, parents, and grandparents, most of whom are living pain levels from 8-10 every day.
In 2019, Calmare is now the only pain relief therapy we offer here in our NJ clinic.
After 10 daily treatment sessions, lasting about 35-minutes each, more than seven in 10 patients achieve a pain-free state or a reduction in pain to the degree that enables them to resume a pleasurable quality of life.
Why do 30 percent not achieve pain relief?
Sometimes they have additional health issues which interfere with treatment, sometimes they are non-compliant after therapy, and sometimes we just don’t know why Calmare did not lessen their pain, unfortunately.
In this era of failed opioid pain relief and increasing difficulty obtaining medication for chronic pain, people in pain are seeking drug-free options to lessen pain.
Nine years since first introducing Calmare scrambler therapy, I have never felt more assured that this treatment can dramatically elevate the quality of life for people living with chronic pain.
Dr. Michael Cooney is one of seven certified Calmare providers in the U.S. His clinic is located just outside New York City. He is a professionally certified chiropractor who has been treating severe acute and chronic pain conditions for more than 35 years.
After introducing Calmare Therapy in 2011, he soon began helping people with treatment-resistant neuropathy from as far away as South America, South Africa, Australia and Europe.
Dr. Cooney offers complimentary phone or video chat consultations with people from outside the U.S. To learn more, visit www.calmaretherapynj.com email info@calmaretherapynj.com or call 201.933.4440.
Depending on the severity of the original condition, and the length of time the patient has been experiencing chronic pain, periodic booster treatments may be required to combat any return of pain.
While many patients never need further scrambler therapy, more advanced stages or prolonged or severe neuropathy, one or more boosters can be extremely useful against an elevation in pain.
What to Do if Your Neuropathic Pain Level Returns or Increases
Calmare patients who experience a recurrence of pain should document when the pain returns, subsides and what environmental issues were involved (stress, weather conditions, excessive use of the affected area) or if there was no specific cause for the elevation of pain.
We hope the lucky fellow who has the honor of taking this young lady to the dance appreciates how special she truly is!
To learn more about Calmare scrambler therapy or schedule booster treatments (even if you’re not preparing for your prom) reach out to our team by emailing us atinfo@calmaretherapynj.com or call our clinic in New Jersey at (201) 933-4440.
Leave it to the teenagers to discover Calmare scrambler therapy on YouTube!
Since we launched scrambler therapy here in New Jersey in 2011, we have used YouTube to share patient case studies with a broader audience seeking drug-free, alternative treatments for chronic nerve pain.
Emma from Montreal is a 16-year-old suffering from CRPS as a result of a fall from a bicycle.
After battling intensifying pain in her right and then left leg for the past year, her neuropathy eventually prohibited her from attending high school and seeing friends regularly.
She had undergone pain management injections and even reported to Ketamine to help lessen her pain.
All efforts were unsuccessful.
A Teenager Discovers Her Own CRPS Pain Relief Solution
She searched “CRPS” on YouTube one day, hoping to discover other young people like her who were socially isolated because of the condition.
During her search, she discovered several teenagers from around the world who had successfully undergone Calmare scrambler therapy with us and left pain-free or at significantly reduced pain levels, including:
Emma and her parents arrived here in Rutherford on February 25, 2019; her pain level hovered around 7.5/10.
Steadily, each day, she underwent her scrambler therapy treatment and most days, her pain level decreased. On the tenth and final day of therapy, she left with a 2/10 pain level, which had been sustained for a few days.
Last summer, high school football player Austin arrived at our clinic using a cane and could not put weight on his leg/foot.
After surgery for a fractured fibula, he was soon diagnosed with CRPS which caused continued shooting pain; over time small treatment-resistant lesions began to develop on his affected foot (center image).
His family had read about our success treating these lesions and resulting chronic nerve pain from complex regional pain syndrome (CRPS) using scrambler therapy.
They flew with Austin from the Southwest for him to undergo treatment and he achieved both pain relief and the lesions on his foot were more than 50% healed after his 2-week treatment (image on right).
Last week, Austin’s parents took the time to let us know how Austin is doing since his scrambler therapy:
Dr. Cooney, Austin is doing wonderful. It has been a 180 since Calmare treatment, we are ever so grateful to you. Below is a video of him snowboarding!!!! Thank you again for all you do!
For the first time, we also began treating people with treatment-resistant low back pain and sciatica and are very excited by these patients’ strong pain relief outcomes. (More on that in early 2019).
You have my word, we have not even begun the fight yet.
If you have been unsuccessful lessening your pain with medication or other pain management therapies, please contact us to discuss your neuropathic pain condition.
Most importantly, don’t give up the fight. Don’t give up hope.
By Dr. Michael Cooney, Clinical Director, Calmare Therapy NJ USA
Most people who visit our website are already frustrated with the medical community.
They or a loved one are in pain.
Pain medication is not pain management, they have learned firsthand.
But a myriad of painful procedures, surgery and implanted devices have also failed to do their jobs.
Then what?
From unexplained neuropathy after surgery to diabetic neuropathy or pain after chemotherapy , too many people are left with unresolved neuropathy.
And they continue to lead debilitated lives, so unfairly.
I came to this conclusion years ago, which is what compelled me to launch Calmare scrambler, an FDA-cleared alternative therapy here in New Jersey in 2011.
From 10-year-old children to seniors who had battled neuropathy for decades, you will discover someone who has fought the same battle with pain that you do.
Then, we hope you’ll reach out via the contact form below, by emailing us at calmarenj@gmail.com or calling our clinic at (201) 933-4440.
Don’t think once your Calmare treatments are over that you’ve heard the last from us. On the contrary, we hope you’ll stay in touch, ask questions and let us know how you’re doing.
Whenever we hear from a patient–on social media, phone or email–we are elated.
She generously allowed us to share her update, sent to us this week, about her life and her health:
Hello to the NJ Calmare Therapy Crew,
It’s been a little under a year since we last made the trek from the midwest to Rutherford, NJ for my second booster treatment, and a lot has changed for me since then, in large part thanks to your team.
It’s not lost on me that if you had told me a little over four years ago where I’d be today, I would have shaken my head in disbelief.
When I first arrived at your clinic in November 2014, you all did more than perform a disappearing act on pain that had been my constant companion for over a year.
Up until that point, I had fully accepted CRPS was going to claim unyielding ownership over my life—my academic career, my physical health, my social life, my happiness.
It felt like everything was deteriorating so quickly, and I was on the verge of completely losing my mind.
Then you showed up in a random google search, and I’ll be honest, your treatment sounded too good to be true. I was truly torn between being desperate enough to try anything– and the fear of being conned.
Believe it or not, while I’d drawn up a list of pros and cons, I decided to flip a coin on the decision to take the risk and go, or pursue other forms of treatment more locally.
Interestingly enough, as a broke college freshman at the time, I didn’t even have a dime to flip. So I drew an X on a Cheez-It and flipped that instead.
I truly believe God may have tipped the cracker in the right direction, because that fateful snack led me halfway across the country to your office, where you all gave me my life back and more, empowering and inspiring me to begin pursuing a career in the healthcare industry.
Liz completes four Calmare booster treatments and heads back to the midwest pain-free.
I finished my undergraduate degree (a BS in Exercise Science) and graduated in early May, then turned right around and began my graduate adventure in the Medical Center’s Doctor of Physical Therapy program a few weeks later.
I’m in class full-time during the week, but still make time to volunteer at the large/exotic cat sanctuary regularly.
I’m able to live the life I never would have thought possible when I graduated high school, but I never take a single second of it for granted.
I just wanted to drop you a note so that when the daily battle against the various forms of chronic pain becomes difficult, you can be reminded that you are making a huge difference in the lives of many.
The work you do matters.
My family and I are forever indebted to how you helped us find peace from a problem we were braced to deal with for a lifetime.
I hope you are all doing well, and trying to enjoy summer’s last stand before the cooler weather arrives for good.
Do you have medication or treatment-resistant chronic pain?
The majority of patients we help here at Calmare Therapy NJ USA have already tried the traditional cocktail of pain management medications, including opioids, injections, Ketamine and other aggressive therapeutic efforts to obtain chronic pain relief, without success.
If you would like to discuss if Calmare might be right for your chronic nerve pain, please complete the info card below:
Gizzelle’s family was able to lodge at the Ronald McDonald House for children and young adults under the age of 21 at a very affordable rate.
Depending on the severity of the original chronic nerve pain condition–and the length of time the patient has been experiencing neuropathy–periodic booster treatments may be required to combat any return of pain after the initial protocol of 10 treatments.
Don’t think once your Calmare treatments are over that you’ve heard the last from us. On the contrary, we hope you’ll stay in touch, ask questions and let us know how you’re doing.
