Better Me with BodyByBree
Better Me with BodyByBree
How Neurofeedback Saved My Child with ADHD and Anxiety with Dr. Licata
What if the hardest behaviors in your home are signals from a brain that needs a different kind of help? We sit down with Dr. Licata of Vital Brain Health to demystify neurofeedback.
We break down the three big reasons brains get out of balance—injury, genetics , and environment —and show how a map turns that mystery into direction. You’ll hear how neurofeedback uses precise rewards to teach the brain better rhythms while the client watches a show or plays a simple game, why 40 sessions is the minimum effective dose for lasting change, and how training daytime sensory motor rhythms supports deeper, more stable sleep at night.
If you’ve been told to “wait and see,” or you’re tired of feeling blamed for behavior you can’t explain, this conversation offers a map, a method, and hope.
Loved this conversation? Subscribe, share it with a friend who needs it, and leave a review to help others find the show. Want to explore brain mapping? Use code BREE to get $150 off an Initial Brain Map at Vital Brain Health. You can find them at www.vitalbrainhealth.com.
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Are you looking for a space where you will learn to improve your mental strength, emotional health, and feel your insecurities from the inside out? Take the first step to living a more meaningful life with a better meeting with money by basically close breeding. I'm a certified personal trainer, entrepreneur, and mother of three. I've helped inform the development of women to take action through fitness, nutrition, medication, personal development, and a mining problem with action. Let's grow together. My son Jameson is seven, and he had ADHD anxiety, and we found the most amazing doctor that did neurofeedback for him, and it completely changed our life. I say had ADHD anxiety because he literally doesn't have it anymore. It was the most amazing blessing for our family. I tell everyone about neurofeedback. And because of that, I kept getting all of these questions. What is it? How can it help my child or me? So I decided to have our specific doctor on the podcast to explain how neurofeedback can help with anxiety, ADHD, sleep issues, autism, impulse control, and so much more. I cannot wait to have you learn from Dr. Lakana. Let's get started. Dr. Lakata is founder and director of Vital Brain Health. His focus is on applied neuroscience, conscious recovery, and interprofessional collaboration. Having cared for thousands of patients with chronic pain, migraines, and concussions, Dr. Lakana deepened his expertise with Andrew Hill, PhDHD at Peak Brain Institute, and Tiff Thompson, PhDHD at Neurofield Neurotherapy. He now works closely with world-renowned EEG expert Jay Gunkelman to better understand and improve concussion recovery, attention, sleep, and anxiety. His unique combination of evidence-based tools in EEG, QEG, ERP, and Applied Neuroscience is used to create one of the leading applied neuroscience centers in the country. Dr. Lakata speaks nationally on topics including brain health, sleep science, performance science, concussion management, and has been featured on ABC, Huffington Post, and national podcast interviews. Welcome to the podcast, Dr. Lakata. How are you today?
SPEAKER_00:I'm doing well. Thanks for having me.
SPEAKER_01:I'm so grateful for your time. I know you are a busy man, but you have literally changed our lives. And I just have to shout it from the rooftops so that we can hopefully help other families that have been in my situation. So I'm so grateful. Thank you so much.
SPEAKER_00:Yes, absolutely. And I'm excited to do so. It's uh it's so fun. I've got three kids too. I know what it's like when they're not doing as well as we want them to do. And um, when you have tools to change them um and improve them and help them be more of who they are. Gosh, I mean, it's just it's so much fun. So good, let's talk about it.
SPEAKER_01:It is. So, first up, give us a little intro on you and maybe how you got involved in neurofeedback.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, um, I've been working with concussions and and head injuries for about 15 years. And about five years ago, we started doing um, we we worked with a company that was doing brain mapping because we wanted to basically understand what was going on in the brain when these athletes and you know adults were getting these concussions. And so um, and so there's basically a type of brain imaging called a Q E E-G, and we can unpack it, of course, in a second. Um, and what I loved about it was it was telling us like what part of the brain was actually not working as well as it should. And um, and then there's this whole other um set of tools that became available called neurofeedback, which um really started allowing us to help these concussion you know injuries um, you know, people were restoring their focus. Um we had guys that were, you know, had concussion injuries from football maybe even a decade ago, and um and they were getting really kind of angry and impulsive and they were losing their temper all the time. And you know, we were helping them restore that again, and they were feeling like they had their mind back. And so um so long story short, we were able to, you know, do that with with that population, and we realized, uh, you know what, you don't have to like keep it limited to people that had full-blown injuries. You can help it with like people that just need a little bit of tuning. And so, you know, we've been working with ADHD and learning disabilities and other things as well. So um, it's a pretty amazing set of tools.
SPEAKER_01:Well, I found you because my friend, her son, had severe ADHD. And we were at the pool one time, and I've I all of a sudden noticed that he was like making eye contact with me and carrying on a conversation, and he wasn't as destructive. And I was like, what's going on with with your son? Like, why is he so good? Like what I it was like I a big change. Like I noticed right off the bat, and she's like, We've been doing neurofeedback and it's been such a blessing. And so I started noticing similar tendencies in Jameson. And um, I'm just kind of gonna give a little bit of a backstory for my listeners who maybe don't know how we found you and the story of Jameson. Yeah. Um, so we did a brain scan with him because we noticed his symptoms were um the impulsivity. Um, he really didn't have like a um, what's the word with your frontal lobe where you have no um self-regulation? It could be self-regulation. Yes, very impulsive. The self-regulation wasn't there. He would um have these downward spirals that would last, like these meltdowns that would last. Like it wasn't normal. It would last like 45 minutes, like seven times a day. It was just, I could tell he was struggling and it wasn't normal. And he hadn't was dealing with a lot of anxiety. And so we took him to Dr. Lakata because I was like, I'll do anything. Like, I don't want to put him on medication. Let's see if we can do it this way first. Um, Dr. Lakata did a whole brain mapping, which is what he's talking about. And the cool part is we had given you a little bit of a background on Jameson, but you told us more about Jameson in the brain map, which is fascinating. Cause he's like, oh yeah, I can see in his brain, like this frontal lobe is not working as well. And he has anxiety, and I can see he does have ADHD, and I could see he's having trouble here, and he has outbursts because of this part of his brain. It was fascinating because it gave us answers to what we were questioning, like, hey, something's off, but we don't know what. And you just nailed it. And to be able to see, he walked us through, he did a whole like call and walked us through basically Jameson's brain, which was the coolest, most fascinating thing ever. So um when someone like the process, I guess, if somebody does want to look into it, that's the first step, right? Is you do the brain map and then you assess where maybe they need some help and where their weak points are.
SPEAKER_00:Right. Exactly. You know, I I I oversimplify, you know, this obviously for parents, but because you know, who says you should be, you know, reading neuroscience articles every day? Um, you know, I say think of the brain like a 21-room mansion, right? Um, so Jameson, he's got 21 rooms, and each room has a different job, the same way like our mansion would have different jobs in the different rooms, right? A kitchen has a different than a bathroom and so on. And so um a brain scanner brain map um is a functional image of the brain. And and so what does that mean? It it helps us see the different rooms. And we're not necessarily looking for full-blown injuries like an MRI would be looking for, because oftentimes an MRI is negative, right? Very few times do people have anything show up on an MRI. Um, but but you know, obviously the person still doesn't feel like they've got everything in balance. And so um it's more sensitive, it's what what's called functional. We can actually see how the different rooms are firing. We know what healthy brain waves look like in certain rooms, and we know when there's brain waves that are you know excessive that shouldn't necessarily be there when when the person is just calm sitting there on the chair. And so um, yeah, and so it gives us a lot of insight. And so let's just say, for example, um somebody has you know um a lot of big outbursts, right? Huge emotions. And so, again, as a parent, this is you know, you're you're you're in the grocery store, your child wants, you know, whatever, um uh cocoa pebbles, and you know, you're saying, no, not today. Maybe, you know, maybe let's get something else. And all of a sudden it's like a half hour tantrum, you know, in the middle of aisle four, right? Like, and you're like, wait a second, like we're not horrible parents, right? We've all had our mistakes, but like this, like, why is he doing this or why is she doing this? And um, and what we can see on a brain map is is that sometimes in areas around the frontal lobe, like some rooms, um, can't fire in these faster brain waves. They're they're firing in these slower brain waves. And um, and when that when that happens, we can pretty much tell you that that child is gonna have a very hard time self-regulating, right? Um, and so that's one example. Like, oh, here's the room, here's what we see it doing, and we can kind of tell you what your child is working with right now, you know, and that's really helpful, I think.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, yeah. Well, the cool part is you were like, okay, what do you want to work on? Do you want to work on self-regulation, anxiety, sleep? Like what? So that was really cool because I was like, okay, the first thing I want to work on is self-regulation. And we saw within two weeks a difference. It was so crazy. And I just have to tell you, before we get into the nitty-gritty of, you know, why we did it, what you kind of do there, what it looks like. Jameson before would say, I hate myself, I want to die. Um, I, you know, horrible things. And we would, I'm I'm the person that is doing positive affirmations with him every morning, you know, and I'm telling him how loved he is and how amazing he is. But it's like he couldn't feel it because his brain just was like short circuiting, basically. And so when, and you even showed me his brain waves were just off the charts, crazy, just like basically fighting with each other. And then once we did these sessions, um, and you showed me halfway through, it was so cool to see how his brain had kind of calmed down and the brain waves were more natural and more peaceful. And it was like his demeanor and just his whole um energy was completely different and he was more calm. Um, now I am telling you, like I have a different child. He's at the top of his class. Um, everyone loves him. His teachers love him. He's kind, he's smart, he's sweet. Like, of course, he's a normal kid that gets upset, but he has not had those spiral meltdowns for months. Like he might have one every, you know, month, like instead of six a day. So our life has changed. Like, I owe you so much because he's excelling and he says all the time, no, I love myself. He'll he'll say that all the time. I love myself. I'm actually really smart, mom. I actually am a good boy. I because he's doing so well, he's not getting the negative reinforcement. So he has more confidence. It's changed every aspect of his personality and his life for good. Um, and so that's why I'm like, we need to share this with people still.
SPEAKER_00:They doing that. That is so huge, right? I mean, oh my gosh, as a parent, I mean, that's like uh that's like half the battle right there.
SPEAKER_01:All right, Dr. Lakata, help us understand. I thought this was fascinating when you explained it to Adam and I. Uh, what are kind of the three main reasons that someone could have an imbalance in their brain?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I I think the three main and most popular reasons are going to be injury, genetics, and the environment, right? So injury could be anywhere from a concussion or like a head injury or neck injury that we didn't think was a concussion, but actually was. Or an injury could be um, you know, birth trauma, believe it or not. Or even I think um we've talked about this in the past, you know, we see where twins, one twin, the way that they were positioned in in the womb, maybe the way they came out, um, is is maybe not, you know, hitting their developmental milestones as quickly or as well as you know, their brother or sister. And and so injury could be, you know, all the way back down to in utero. So, and and everything you know in between.
SPEAKER_01:So that is fascinating. I have a question about that. What about if a baby, you know how they come, like if they're use the forceps to get their head out, or if they're sitting in the birth canal too long? Um, could any of those issues?
SPEAKER_00:Yes, yes, yes, yes, absolutely. So, you know, forceps, um, vacuum, um, where they're literally put like a really powerful suction cup on the head while in order to pull with more traction, um, those can cause injury. I mean, by far. And again, the challenge is is that it's it's not life-threatening injury, it's not bleeding in the brain. And so for the most part, medical doctors are just gonna say, well, it's quote unquote within normal limits, right? So But it leaves a mark. So, yeah, so absolutely any of those can happen. And also, right, um, when you know the the baby is sitting, maybe crowning, but not fully out, and it's taking longer than than everybody would like. Well, that that's time when there's stress on the brain, that's time when there's um sometimes a little bit less oxygen in the brain, and um and it leaves a mark. It doesn't, again, it's it's it's not debilitating.
SPEAKER_01:Right.
SPEAKER_00:That's interesting. Yeah, yeah. So so that's easy. And it and in fact, it happens a lot more than than people think. I mean, I I'll just give you my example. Um I had you know pretty significant ADHD. And so um, but you know, I was I I I I process quickly and I and I have a lot of interest and so on. And so I went on and got three degrees, and you know, I've had thousands of patients, and I was on different boards uh, you know, throughout the US, and still I didn't feel like I had everything, you know, I wasn't doing anything to the level I I knew I could. And it'd be it was very hard for me to actually then sit and do something like, you know, taxes at the end of the year, like almost impossible. So, long story short, my first brain map years ago showed that I had some residual injury. Um these are called transient slow waves. Um, and it's it's when there's white matter injury, white matter damage. And so um turns out it was most likely what I what I think from old concussions, probably, you know, when I was younger in high school, I played football, basketball, I snowboarded, skateboarded. And so um here I am, like, you know, 20 years later. And some of the things that that are quote unquote ADHD and inattentive for me were actually related back to that. Because once I trained and I and I was able to help, you know, those areas heal and on the remap, they though those slow waves went away. It also you know matched up with my ability to actually stay way more focused than I think I was able to remember.
SPEAKER_01:That's fascinating. So injury could be anything. I remember when we were doing our brain map with you, we thought Jameson's stuff was because he had uh fallen when he was younger. And Adam blamed himself so much for that. And when we actually looked at his brain, you were like, no, it's actually not injury, it's actually hereditary. Yeah. So it's Adam's brain. He got it from Adam's brain, but he didn't, it wasn't from injury. So he could like breathe at night, knowing that, like, okay, I didn't do this to my child from him falling. You know, it was an accident, totally an accident. But that's just fascinating that you can know that. So there's injury. What are the other two?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. So, you know, genetics or, you know, what we call phenotypes. And so um, there have been quite a few studies that have shown that there are certain brain patterns or brain types that um we inherit from mom, dad, or both. And so some of these could be traits that will look like aspects of like anxiety or high arousal. Um, it can look like um sometimes a tendency to get fixated or obsessive. Um, you know, there could be other things, even ADHD types. I mean, you know, a lot of parents will often come to me and say, you know, my my son or daughter are having all these issues and they have really hard time focusing in, and you know, you know, my husband also has this challenge, or also I have this challenge. And so there are phenotypes. We can see them. People, you know, pe people way smarter than me have already done the research and have shown that that these uh correlate. And then again, you know, you can change them. So, but yeah, so that's that's the genetic side. And I'm sure there's probably gonna be more that we discover as time goes on. Um, but uh at the very least, I think there are now 12 identified, you know, phenotypes, genetic uh tendencies that are that we can see in the brain.
SPEAKER_01:Well, that's fascinating because we always joke that my daughter Olivia got my um mother-in-law's OCD.
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Like she we see it in her because I'm like, I have no idea where this came from. Like, this is not, I am not in any way OCD, and like I'm not super organized, but she just came out like organizing her shoes, and you know, like as a little child, and we joke that that came from Michelle, but it really did. Like it actually did come from her.
SPEAKER_00:Right. Yes, you can totally see now that the trait coming through, right?
SPEAKER_01:So fascinating.
SPEAKER_00:So fascinating. And you know, I I I'm I'm always looking for metaphors, and sometimes they work and sometimes they don't, but you know, when we say OCD, uh there's an area of the brain called the anterior cingulate, and that that area can tend to overfire. And um, and so I I also I liken it to like a volume knob, right? Like we can inherit the tendency for that to be maybe at a setting of like five and above. Maybe if it gets all the way to like a nine or a 10, then now we get those you know big scary diagnoses of like OCD, right? Um, like the actual um uh diagnostic code. But um, you know, but oftentimes, but what happens when that's like at a seven or a six? Like it's still affecting us. It's we're still you know expressing this trait, but it's not as bad. And some people are like at a four or at a three, right? So again, there's a little bit of a continuum or a little bit of a volume knob um rather than like a light switch, like you know.
SPEAKER_01:Yes, that's fascinating. You might be on a different scale than someone else.
SPEAKER_00:Yes, but you just like grandma, right?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah. Interesting. Okay.
SPEAKER_00:And then the third, you know, so the first injury, the second was was genetics or or inherited traits. And then the third is environmental. And you know, and environmental could be um, it could be mold exposure, it could be um heavy metals, it could be, you know, I don't get to see what they are. What we get to see on a brain map is are things like, you know, we're I'm just gonna throw out a term, you know, like like global slowing of the brain. Um and so, and what we know based on on the physiology is that, well, it seems like that when that's the case, when we refer those people out then to functional medicine doctors or naturopaths or others, or sometimes they're they're they're primaries. Um, what we see is that when they go and do the testing, they'll often find, you know, very high levels of, you know, again, name it, right? Very high levels of of um mold uh toxicity, very high levels of aluminum. Um, and so then you know, we get to have them do, you know, go through their treatments and detoxes with their with their therapist. And then after that, then we remap. And then we can actually begin to help track some of the changes, at least from the brain's perspective.
unknown:Right?
SPEAKER_01:That's so fascinating. So when you so how this is helping, like let's say someone comes in, how does knowing this information help them moving forward?
SPEAKER_00:Right. Well, I I'd say, you know, two things, I think, usually. One, it's often extremely validating, right?
SPEAKER_01:It is, it's so validating. I was like, thank you, I'm not crazy. Like that you can see what your child is doing and the behavior that they have, but to actually look at it on a brain map and say, this is why, it's just so validating.
SPEAKER_00:Yes, exactly. And that's so, so one, it's validating. Um, and I think that that has huge, immense value in and of itself. And then, and two, um, once we see, you know, the underlying patterns, it's not my job to diagnose or necessarily treat. It's my job to say, hey, we see these patterns. These tend to be associated with whatever you know the person has. And then, you know, what we're able to do is then help direct the the parents maybe to the right, you know, professionals. And oftentimes it's not just one, it's it's the right team, right? And so it may be, um, so let's use an example. Um, you know, sometimes a child uh reserves the right to have more than one problem at a time. So we we had a young a young child who had real significant um outbursts. Now, outbursts can be from a lot of things. Um, this person, um, she was about 12 and she had huge, massive outbursts, and they were violent, meaning she would attack her parents.
unknown:Right?
SPEAKER_00:Um and and so um, and it turns out she had what we call sharp and slow um activity in the brain. Um, how did it come? We're assuming it was from injury. We're assuming we don't get to know that. Um, and though she had some other things going on. And so, based on that, we were able to then refer her to um, you know, and and to basically uh a psychiatrist or neurologist so that they can, you know, so the parents can decide if they want her to be on anti-seizure medication. We also referred her to a functional medicine doctor to kind of help them with diet and understand how, you know, sugars and other things are gonna make this worse. And then, of course, you know, things like keto or keto-like food are gonna make it better. And then we also were on her team, and our job was to help, you know, help the brain produce more stabilizing rhythm because neurofeedback it got on the map out of UCLA because it showed to be so helpful with epileptiform activity or seizures. And so, um, and so it helped us create a game plan or helped us, you know, co-create a game plan with the parent, right? And so, um, and it's not always about us, it's about just, well, what does that person have? And so you can't create a solution if you can't define the problem, right?
SPEAKER_01:Right.
SPEAKER_00:So I love that. So it definitely helps the parents kind of get out of the uh just out of the dark, right? I mean, so many times we're just like, you know, reaching and maybe hoping for some insight as to what to do next. And um, and oftentimes it's really hard to tell.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. And what are some of the symptoms that you see that you can help correct?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. So, so for instance, um, okay, so definitely with emotional regulation, I think is huge. Huge.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, that was our biggest thing with Jamison.
SPEAKER_00:That was your biggest thing with Jameson, absolutely. And so, and what I have found is that nine times out of ten, the child doesn't want to have the outbursts.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, well, they feel like a failure, they feel like a problem child.
SPEAKER_00:Yes, yes. And so nine times out of ten, it's not misbehavior, it's not or parenting, you know, um, faults. Nine times out of ten, it's really areas of the brain that cannot do their job to maintain regulation. And so, in the words of Dan Siegel, you know, they they flip their lid very, very easily because certain parts of the brain aren't aren't as strong as they should be, right? So that would I'd say is probably one of our most common. Um, you know, um another part of regulation is anxiety. And so I'd say the second one after outbursts are going to be things like anxiety. And now, you know, we all live in a post-COVID world where it seems like every child, rightly so, is feeling anxious and stressed, right?
SPEAKER_01:Right. And or adult, like you help adults too, not just children.
SPEAKER_00:Many, many, many adults, many parents that come in, um, many, you know, young adults as well. But oftentimes, you know, look, we we live in an overwhelming world. And so if we already have a tendency to be anxious because of, let's say we inherited some of it, um, and maybe we had trauma, we can actually see certain patterns associated with trauma, um, then you know, then oftentimes we're able to identify it in the brain and then also help it. So um, so emotional regulation or outbursts, anxiety, and then if I said that there were, you know, I mean, uh, two more. Um, believe it or not, we see a lot of children with on the autism spectrum or with Asperger's. A lot. In fact, if you would have asked me five years ago if I thought I would be, you know, serving this population as much as I am now, I would have said, no, I don't think so. Um, you know, I don't think that that's really um you know something that that you know we would intentionally go out to to help. But you know, we see so many. And um we're we'll never claim to treat autism. However, a brain, you know, a child's brain that you know is on the spectrum will have certain patterns. Um, you know, oftentimes the the areas of the brain don't talk well with each other as well as they should. And you can see it on a map and you can improve it. Another pattern they can have is they can actually become very rigid or obsessive, right? Um they only will they'll only eat these two foods, or they're or they're only, you know, they only want to you know do you know eat at this one place or do this one thing, and anything new is always an immediate no. Um that's that's goes back to the volume knob of the anterior cingulate, right? And so um their errors have to do with regulation. They can't self-regulate. So um there are a lot of things that we can help as far as like improving those volume knobs in those traits for them.
SPEAKER_01:So that is fascinating.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, and and it's and and it's now become a probably the fastest growing aspect of our practice. Um, are you know, families that are coming in with children that are on spectrum. And it's pretty profound. It's pretty profound. I mean, we we see many, many kids. In fact, we're seeing, I mean, we've got probably at least a dozen right now that are somewhere in their teens, um, usually pretty high functioning as far as this group is. Um, and um, but they're very rigid, very um obstinate. They will refuse to do anything that that isn't within their own comfort zone. And they'll often then have outbursts that gets triggered by the exation. Right. So now, you know, as as we're working with them, like they become, it's like they move way down the scale in that spectrum. They move to way higher levels of function. Um, and then they're able to kind of preserve their superpowers because most kids on the spectrum have some superpower. They're they're just you know, they've got some gifting that we don't have. Um, and so now they're able to kind of have this amazing, you know, improvement. While they may still be technically on the spectrum, now they're just way more functional, right?
SPEAKER_01:So that is so cool. That's so cool. And also sleep. I know you help with sleep too.
SPEAKER_00:Right. Yep, yep. And so um, you know, there are many areas of the brain that are necessary uh for sleep. And um, yeah, we we help we we help with so many, with so many. In fact, there's actually things that we call sleep spindles that are the very thing that we train during the day. They're called sensory motor rhythms. And you know, during the day they're what give you the ability to be calm and focused. Um at night, they're what help you stay asleep. And so if we train that muscle, quote unquote, you know, during the day, um, then you can use it during the day to be more stable. And then guess what? You get to use that same quote unquote muscle so you can sleep better at night. And so, yes, oftentimes sleep is almost always what we call comorbid or an additional symptom that the person checks if they have anxiety, dysregulation, um, ex. Almost everybody with concussions, there are things that we see and there are things that improve.
SPEAKER_01:Wow. That is so cool. Even just to know that there's some help out there. Even my um nephews, I have three nephews, they're all alcohol fetal syndrome babies that they had adopted from foster care. And they're all doing neurofeedback and it has completely changed their life.
SPEAKER_00:Wonderful. So wonderful. I love it.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. We are believers. So I just have a couple of questions on specifics because I know people will wonder. Um, what are you doing in a session? Like briefly, what is it? What are you doing and kind of explain that process? And how many sessions do they need to improve?
SPEAKER_00:Totally. Okay. So the quick setting is think of this, think of your brain like a 21-room mansion, right? That's that's my simplest, you know, metaphor. Um, there are many rooms in the brain and many hallways. And so um, it's not like the whole brain gets trained, you know, at any one moment. Um based on a person's map, we get to see which rooms could use some remodeling, right? Um some improvement. And so um, and that's really key. Then, so what do we do? Once we know the rooms and we know what they're doing, they're firing too much or too little, too fast, too slow, in which frequencies and how. Um then, you know, a person basically either comes into the office or they're training remotely. They put a sensor over the area of the of the brain where that that room is, and we train, we we customize what kind of free what we want the brain to do more of. Okay. So um, and so basically somebody's sitting with uh some kind of, you know, maybe they're watching Netflix, they're watching a show, and there's a sensor over room in the brain. And we will see real time that person's brain waves over that one room. And let's say we want that room to fire more in a particular frequency. Well then great. When they're producing the frequency that's creating some of that dysregulation, um, the Netflix show will go into a little bit of black and white and it'll look like there's rain on the screen. And when their brain is able to produce more of the frequency that we want over that room, um, the Netflix show goes back into color and it looks like the rain on the screen goes away. And so, and what's happening is as far as the person's concerned, they're pretty much passively watching a movie. Um but what is actually occurring you know underneath the surfaces, um we're rewarding the brain to when it produces more of this right kind of frequency. And so in one 30-minute session, and it's usually about 30 minutes, it's usually about you know any anywhere between two and five times a week. Um during that time, um, the person may get you know 900 to a thousand little feedback loops, little, little, little rewards saying, good job, do that again, do that one again, produce that again, right?
SPEAKER_01:And so um to you're basically strengthening the the positive neurofeedback waves instead of the negative.
SPEAKER_00:Correct, correct. Or or another way to say it is um the person that that part of the brain should be able to produce both. We want it to learn how to produce more of this thing so that it can use it again in the future.
SPEAKER_01:Interesting.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, Jameson loved he would try to control a car with his brain. Like he's hooked up with the electrodes for my listeners, and he would look at the car on the screen. And if he wasn't focused, the car would veer off the road. And then when he'd focus on the screen, it he's basically driving the car with his brain. It was fascinating. So he's thinking this is so cool. He's just playing a video game, but really it's like rewiring his brain, which is fascinating.
SPEAKER_00:Yes. And and we pay tens of thousands of dollars for all kinds of games and interfaces, right? So, so yeah, so he was able to play the video game. So it's the same idea, though, right? He's getting rewarded when his brain is producing the right thing. And with him, the the video game car would would, you know, would race other cars and it would go forward and win. And if it if it didn't, it it wouldn't, right? So um, we have flying games, we have puzzle games, we have carnival games. Oh boy. I mean, we we pay for a lot of these. And at the end of the day, it's mostly so that whoever the child is, is they're going to be interested in it, right? But it can go back to as simple as um, you know, also watching a a movie with that inner overlay. And it's not, it's not the game format per se that's really doing the trick.
SPEAKER_01:Right.
SPEAKER_00:Knowing where where we're training, knowing what we're trying to train, and then following it so that until the brain finally learns how to access that again.
SPEAKER_01:So cool. So, how many sessions do they need to do? I know it's probably different for everyone, and maybe they need to do a consult first.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Yes. It's so it's so in our office, what we do is if we take we won't take someone on if we don't think we can get at least like a 30 to 50% improvement in that that person's primary goal. Right. If we do, um then what we see is we we have a round of training which is about 40 sessions. And and the reason why we do that is because you know, neurons that fire together wire together. And so, and because we see so many complex cases, we really want to make sure that we start slow, make sure we get to know the brain, and not have any kind of potential, you know, responses to the training that isn't ideal. And then we want to, you know, do some, you know, focus on targeting the area that we want, and then we want enough, you know, repetition afterwards so that when we're done, like Jameson, um, the brain learns it's lasting. The brain learns to keep it, right? Because then every time he's regulated, every time he doesn't flip out, um, he's reinforcing that again, right? And so he's able to kind of self-reinforce, right? So for us, around is about 40 sessions. And and from what I found, talking to hundreds of other um high-level practitioners, that is seems to be the minimum effective dose. Um and so, yeah, and so that's that's what we do. And so we do that also not, we do it remotely.
SPEAKER_01:So if someone's interested in signing up, the first step would you would have them do the brain scan, go over the brain scan, and then decide a plan after that.
SPEAKER_00:Correct. Yeah. Yes.
SPEAKER_01:And and we do have a code for my listeners, right? That we want to give out. So you can actually get$50 off of your brain scan if you use the code BRE. So if you're interested, they are located in Pasadena. Um, what if people don't have access to, you know, what if they don't live in California or they're not close to Pasadena? Do you have a remote option for them?
SPEAKER_00:We do. We do. We now have, we've been, we've been waiting for years uh for the technology to catch up. And so we now have a remote option. And so people that are interested can reach out and we can go over those details with them as well. So yes, we've got all across the country and beyond.
SPEAKER_01:That is so exciting. So also if someone is wanting to do neurofeedback in person where they are, are there certain qualifications that they look for in someone that's offering? Because I know there's a lot out there.
SPEAKER_00:Yes, yes. So um, in essence, I I would probably go to isnr.org. Um, it's the, I want to say it's the uh internationals, let me see, IS International Society for Neuroregulation and Research. And so, and that I think has a good um membership list. At least you'll make sure that people are somewhat qualified. But it's a pretty heterogeneous group, meaning a lot of people do a lot of things. And so, um, but I think that's the first place. And I think that at the very least, um, whoever you are going to work with should have at least some kind of certification or diplomat. So, for instance, we have uh we have a diplomate in quantitative EEG. So we we believe that you should know what you're reading on a map before you tell somebody what to train. And so um, there's also um another that's called a BCIA um certification. And so you just want some like most basic um, you know, certification so that that you know that they've got a baseline skill set. But other than that, I think isnr.org is a probably great place to start.
SPEAKER_01:I love that. So can you share with our listeners where to find you?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, so vitalbrainhealth.com is probably the best way to reach out to us.
SPEAKER_01:Um and or you can you also have an Instagram, right?
SPEAKER_00:And we have an Instagram, yes, yes. I'm not the one that that's on it very much, but yes, uh um some of our team is on it. So if they want to just uh DM through that, they can definitely do so.
SPEAKER_01:Awesome. Thank you so much. This was very, very helpful, helpful, Dr. Lakata. Thank you.
SPEAKER_00:Love it, Brie. Thank you for having me and thanks for uh sharing this with more families. We all need it.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, I shout it from the rooftops to everybody, anyone in anyone that will listen. Like, there's a better way. Neural feedback.
SPEAKER_00:Yes, absolutely. Well, thank you again.
SPEAKER_01:Thank you. I'll talk to you later.
SPEAKER_00:All right.
SPEAKER_01:Bye. Thank you for joining us in today's episode. If you liked the content and want to hear more, remember to hit that subscribe button and write a review. As a small business owner, I appreciate it more than you know. If you are looking for a program to help with self-confidence, to lose weight, get in shape, and work on your mental, physical, and emotional health. Check out my training programs on www.bodyby.com. My team and I help to hold you accountable through the Body Bible app, where you log in to see all your workouts, custom meal plan made specifically for you and your needs, and communication through the messenger. You are never alone when you're on the Body Bible training program. Click the link in the show notes to get more information on how to transform your life from the inside out.
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