Healthy Habits - The Breath of Life: How Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy (HBOT) is Revolutionizing Fertility for Men and Women

 By Alex Williams, Founder and CEO of Holistic Hyperbarics

According to the CDC, 12 percent of women and 10 percent of men ages 15 to 44 have reproduction issues. As a result, the United States’ fertility industry is valued at $8 billion, according to a 2021 Harris Williams Industry Update, and the industry is estimated to grow globally to $21.7 billion by 2025 as millions of hopeful parents make huge investments into their families’ futures. 

What if almost all of these hopeful parents’ investments were guaranteed? A common element helping make that dream a reality – oxygen.

Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy (HBOT), used in conjunction with programs such as In Vitro Fertilization (IVF), Intrauterine Insemination (IUI) or Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection (ICSI), is seeing upwards of 90 rates success rates in supporting their patients to conceive and birth a healthy child, helping them protect their investments in costly assisted fertility programs.

Put simply, Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy is just pressure and oxygen: it is a giver of general resources, not just fertility support. It increases adenosine triphosphate (ATP), also known as cellular energy. Simultaneously, an increase in pure oxygen stimulates growth and decreases inflammation. When your body is equipped with more resources, it is able to heal and perform optimally. In the case of fertility, it increases the ability to successfully conceive, implant, and birth a healthy child.

With the natural changes that come with aging, as well as lifelong inundations with harmful chemicals, inhalants, and radiation from daily surroundings, one’s child-birthing years are inherently reduced.

Whether for support of the male or female sexual organs, hyperbaric oxygen therapy is a tremendous resource that essentially works to reverse this damage. HBOT provides extra support that works superbly in complement with all In Vitro Fertilization (IVF), Intrauterine Insemination (IUI), Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection (ICSI) and unassisted conception programs.

Here are some additional benefits of HBOT that are often misconceived by people:

1. HBOT works synergistically alongside IVF, IUI, and ICSI programs; not against nor in place of it. Hyperbaric facilities can work in conjunction with fertility doctors and clinics.
   
   
2. HBOT is a financially sensible adjunct. Assisted fertility programs can cost upwards of $30,000. A full round of HBOT is about $1,900. The success rate is almost guaranteed for patients who have used the two programs together, helping them avoid additional rounds of assisted fertility programs.
   
   
3. Fertility is not just an issue of the female sex organs. Conceiving a baby has just as much to do with the health and vitality of the sperm as the ovaries and uterus. Both parents are encouraged to participate in HBOT as it can drastically improve the quality of sperm in its motility, velocity, penetrative strength, and count. Erectile dysfunction can also be improved. Of course, the benefits are abundant for women as well: HBOT reduces inflammation often as a result of pelvic inflammatory disease, increases blood vessels in the uterus for the egg to implant, and thickens the uterine lining.
   
   
4. HBOT is a non-invasive and relaxing experience that is as simple as taking breaths in a pressurized space, much like a passenger would in an airplane. The devices are spacious and bright with windows, blankets, and pillows – nothing like the MRI-type tank that most expect.

Peer-reviewed research backs these findings. Though the research has yet to reflect the even higher success rates found by Holistic Hyperbarics, one thing is clear: HBOT works for fertility. HBOT increases endometrial thickness upwards of 20 percent, stimulates the growth of new blood vessels, improves endometrial oxygenation, supports ovarian angiogenesis, expands ovarian volume by boosting follicular development, fortifies egg quality, and decreases inflammation and scar tissue that may be blocking the egg’s movement (Fertility and Sterility, ARSM. In male sex organs, HBOT balances pH values, decreases fructose concentrations in sperm, improves Hypo Osmotic Swelling (HOS) test scores, bolsters sperm count, lessens sperm DNA fragmentation, induces penile angiogenesis, improves erectile function, reverses the basic common pathophysiology of atherosclerosis, abates penile perfusion, and proliferates new blood vessels in the testicles (ClinMed International Library).

Unlike localized treatment, HBOT treats the whole body and allows the body to allocate energy and oxygen wherever it is lacking. The human body is made up of only four types of tissue that all require oxygen to thrive. The epithelial cells in infected wounds are the same epithelial cells in the uterus.

The benefits of using HBOT to bolster fertility are abundant. You will find that your sleep quality will improve, injuries will heal faster, skin will become more buoyant, and energy levels will increase. You are providing your body with more resources to complete all of its functions, in addition to fertility.

Family planning is beautiful, so increase your body’s natural ability to do what it organically wants to do and protect the investment of your fertility journey.

About Alex:
Alexandra Williams, Founder & CEO of Holistic Hyperbarics has cultivated a reputation as an extraordinarily driven, successful and heart centered leader in the hyperbaric oxygen therapy space (HBOT). As the only Black woman HBOT clinic owner/founder in the United States, Alex built upon her experience in the healing arts as an EMT, an in-home birth doula, and home recovery, adding hyperbarics to her expertise and offering hyperbaric therapy as an accessible solution for many common conditions and injuries.