The Photonic Stimulator: What it is. What it does.  How it might work.

by Len Ochs, Ph.D.

A photonic stimulator is a device that emits infrared light.  Infrared light has been used for decades to treat and relieve some types of pain, to promote healing after mechanical and burn trauma, as well as to treat arthritic conditions.  Although this particular device is not yet FDA registered, the FDA has registered similar devices as Class 2 medical devices, which are held to a performance standard, rather than to an efficacy standard.  In other words, it has to work as it’s advertised, that is, it must reliably generate infrared.

It is, in essence, a flashlight that shines light that cannot be seen.  Beyond its application to pain and wounds, it has direct impact on the work done with neurofeedback in its ability to temporarily block sympathetic nervous system activity.

First some background:  The finger and toe tips are richly supplied with blood vessels.  There are, in the walls of the blood vessels, sympathetic nerve fibers – also in high concentrations.  When these fibers are firing, blood vessels constrict; and sympathetic impulses travel up the spinal column to the brain, lowering the threshold for electrical noise generation in the brain.  This noise, in turn, desynchronizes the EEG activity, makes seizures easier to happen, and contributes to the difficulty of finding easier success to neurofeedback.  When these impulses are blocked, neurofeedback works faster and more efficaciously; and patients become much more comfortable.

A similar kind of response is seen in cases of fibromyalgia, phantom limb, and other kinds of brain-generated pain.  When there is a constant barrage of pain afferents – impulses traveling up the spinal column to the brain – the brain becomes disorganized in its response to pain primarily in two ways.   First, it misidentifies muscle signals indicating presence, pressure, and position as pain, when there is no pain in the muscles involved.  Second, it misidentifies the locations of pain signals.   It mismaps them.  So, for instance, toes might be felt, when the lower limb might have been amputated.  The signals are actually originating from the stump of the limb.  However, the brain might misinterpret these signals as toe signals.  The photonic stimulation helps interrupt the sensory signals, giving the brain a chance to re-map and correctly attribute the sources and qualities of sensation as they really should be.

There are a number of ideas about how photonic stimulation works.  But they are theories at this stage of the game.  There are bits of research that appear correct.  But we don’t yet know how they all fit together.  First there’s the interruption theory.  Just interrupting the incorrectly-perceived sensations seems to give the brain enough of a break that it re-evaluates these sensations and correctly identifies them, or their origin, for the first time in perhaps a long time.  In addition, interruptions in the way signals interact between the blood vessels and the networks of nerves can interrupt the mechanisms that perpetuate pain, leaving the correct signals a chance to be generated. 

A second body of theory has to do with the way the mitochondria – the tiny organs in the cells responsible for the production of respiration and energy production at a cellular level – orient themselves in particular toward infrared light.  Infrared light seems to stimulate these cellular components to function better – more youthfully, if you will – and wounds heal more as they did when we were younger.  Tissue seems to regrow at a much faster rate than we would expect. 

There are several consequences as we use the photonic stimulators to help teach the body to become more adaptive, and less shut down in its responses.  Pain decreases.  Thus, we have more energy simply because we have less pain.  We are much less exhausted because of pain.  We can think more easily, logically, and reasonably.  We have less depression, and more mobility.  We are less irritable.  Those who are primarily non-verbal have a much easier time, and carry much less anger.  Those who are extremely sensitive and who have tics and seizures will find temporary but rapid decreases in their seizure thresholds.  This makes it a lot easier for neurofeedback to work successfully, and brings breaks in these problems that support hopefulness.  The photonic stimulation is, in itself, reasonably weak, neutral stimulation that can be easily controlled.  As such, it is an ideal way to begin the desensitization of highly sensitive people who tend to over-react to stimulation, and thus prepare them for neurofeedback.  It can also be used as a brain stimulus, especially in the front of the head, to help temporarily reduce mental fog, as well as to abort migraines.  This, again, helps neurofeedback to work more easily.

Much more research is needed in the US.  However photonic stimulation has been widely used in Europe for decades.  It will be a while before we understand it’s benefits and limitations – which will change as the technology changes.