Retirement

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When people have lived long enough to arrive at retirement, a stage of life that needs to be enjoyed and not endured, many often experience challenges in their health, mind and emotions that ruin this beautiful part of their lives.

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Brain Gain Neurofeedback training is designed to help you to prevent memory loss!

Regular neurofeedback sessions will stimulate increased blood-flow to the brain therefore significantly increasing concentration and memory. The effect of this amazing, measurable science will affect permanent change in your brain to benefit your life on many different levels.

What to expect? You will undergo an easy 30-minute computerised evaluation to determine current cognitive performance levels. After this, you will do weekly Neurofeedback Training sessions where you will learn to control your attention and focus with the help of a computer that shows you a DVD film. The film and sounds plays when you pay close attention, and stops when your attention decreases below a certain level. By doing this, you will learn to control the film and your attention and focus. The goal is to make the film play for longer periods of time and this is a gradual learning process.

So, what is neurofeedback training?

Neurofeedback training is a type of biofeedback that allows people to learn how to control parts of their brain function. It depends on biological signals such as the amount of oxygen rich blood that is delivered to areas of the brain. Once someone becomes aware of a biological signal, they can learn to control it.

At Brain Gain we use near infrared spectroscopy neurofeedback to train people to increase blood flow to the prefrontal areas of the brain.

Why is brain blood flow important?

It is simple, because the brain requires energy to work and fuel for the brain (oxygen and glucose) is conveyed by blood. When an area of the brain becomes more active during a task, it requires increased blood supply because it needs more energy.

This increased need for oxygen is met by more oxygen-rich blood being carried to that part of the brain. Improved blood flow assists in developing healthier neural functioning. Blood brings needed nutrients and removes toxins so adequate blood flow is required for brain growth and repair.

Step 1: TESCA

At Brain Gain we evaluate a client’s cognitive ability in detail before and after training. This is essential because it helps to identify attention problems and determine the success of training by comparing results before and after training. Our clients complete the TESCA test that was specifically developed in South Africa. This comprehensive test measures 6 attention abilities, and screens for emotional and specific cognitive developmental issues that may hold someone back from reaching their full potential. The test takes 30 minutes to complete and the results are analyzed and recommendations are made.

Step 2: The INTERESTING part!

Using the flow of healthy, oxygenated blood to the frontal lobe of the brain while a client participates in a cognitive activity (watching a program or playing a game), a feedback mechanism is created which indicates – in real time – how much attention the brain is paying to the task at hand. As long as the client remains focused on the activity, blood flow is naturally maintained or increased (through a clever physiological mechanism known as Neurovascular Coupling) and the program continues to play. The moment that the client becomes distracted and attention wanders, activity in the frontal lobe decreases, followed almost instantly by a drop in the blood flow and the program comes to a halt, alerting the client to their loss of focus. Only once they have regained their concentration and restored blood flow, does the program re-start.