Can Audio-visual Entrainment Treat Depression?

The word ‘depression’ needs no explanation, and millions worldwide are victims of this hard-to-treat disease. And when we say hard-to-treat, we are discussing antidepressants. Despite being widely used, patients avoid it for their side effects, dependency, and ineffectiveness in cases like Treatment-resistant depression. 

Here’s where audio-visual entrainment takes the lead. Also known as brainwave entrainment, this therapy is known to treat depression by stimulating certain parts of the brain. It improves altered brainwaves in depression, providing an effective response similar to antidepressant medications. With simple, pulsating tones at adjusted frequencies, audio-visual entrainment uses sound and light waves to benefit depression, with minimum side effects in the long run.

Let’s simplify why audio-visual entrainment is proving to be effective in treating depression.

Brainwaves and depression

The brain is composed of millions of neurons and nerve cells communicating through electrical signals. These neural pathways are responsible for our mood and mental state.

Unfortunately, when depression sets in, these pathways malfunction due to overactivity or under-activity of the brain waves. This leads to mental and physical changes like poor sleep, low energy levels, decreased concentration, feelings of isolation, anxiety, and more.

For sending messages to communicate, our brain uses nerve impulses. Such an impulse is generated as electrical signals, carried in the form of waves having different frequencies. And the higher the wave frequency, the more intense the response toward particular stimuli. These waves are called brainwaves, and our brain produces different types for different purposes.

One of those waves is alpha waves (8-12 Hz) produced in relaxed conditions, where you focus less on work and more on meditation. 

The discrete production of alpha waves in the brain is a significant marker of depression. And our goal is to employ neurofeedback to synchronize disturbed alpha waves at a normal level or increase them in most cases. So, by increasing alpha waves in the parts where it’s lower than usual, the person reaches a sense of satiety and sees things positively.

Similarly, other findings conclude that major depressive patients have low theta waves and high beta waves than normal. Beta waves (12.5 to 30 Hz) are involved in logical and conscious thinking, while theta waves (4-8 Hz) are involved in causing sleep.

The effect of combining audio-visual entrainment with neurofeedback for depression.

The concept of Audio-visual entrainment therapy wasn’t limited to only one type of depression and has been proven successful for complicated depressive disorders like Seasonal affective disorder (SAD), Treatment-resistant depression, etc. Here’s how combining neurofeedback with Audio-visual entrainment therapy proved to be successful in clinical trials conducted on different types of depressive patients:

• According to the LSN research review report, Audio-visual Neurotherapy improves treatment-resistant depression by 70.9% and shows benefits after a single session.
• Another study proved that beta wave entrainment through an audio-visual entrainment device reduced depression in 100% of Seasonal affective disorder patients, while 84% became non-depressed.
• Also, Audio-visual entrainment reduced HAM-D scores significantly in depressive patients entrained with beta and delta waves. HAM-D, or Hamilton rating scale for depression, is a score used to evaluate depression and should be low in non-depressed patients.

Therefore, one can bring these altered brainwaves to the average level by employing efficient neurofeedback. Neurofeedback is a kind of therapy where you control the brain function by measuring brainwaves and correcting them via giving feedback. This feedback may be in the form of audio and visual stimuli.

An audio-visual entrainment device uses sound and light to generate binaural waves. Binaural waves have two frequencies synced together to produce a single wave. The frequency of the wave is the difference between the individual waves. This frequency is equivalent to the type of brainwave you want to rectify in the brain. For example, the device will produce binaural waves at 10 Hz to correct alpha waves. 

These waves are sent through headphones and LED glasses. When the person wears both or one, the pulsating waves in the form of sound and flashing light cross the Cranial nerves (at the eyes and ears) and correct the altered brainwaves by syncing with them.

How to conduct an audio-visual entrainment therapy session for depression?

Like in any other therapy, there are guidelines and precautionary steps that you should follow to get the best out of your audio-visual entrainment device. Here’s a short guide:

• Drink a glass of water before taking any AVE session (at least for the first six weeks in case of depression).
• Wear your device and set the frequencies of binaural waves as per device instructions. 
• For best effects, keep your eyes closed throughout the session (though keeping them open is also okay).
• Consider the time of the day you are performing the audio-visual entrainment sessions. For instance, take beta and delta sessions at night and alpha and theta sessions anytime other than morning.
• You can always reduce or increase the beats as per your pain tolerance if experienced.

But no matter what type of depression you have, please consult a doctor before taking any audio-visual entrainment sessions. While clinical trials have shown promising results, the therapy should ideally be discussed with a healthcare professional in order to ensure that it is suitable for your condition.

Wrap Up

Depression is a complicated disease and affects different people differently. Most people are hesitant to follow traditional therapy due to side effects and costly reasons. However, audio-visual entrainment devices have been studied to treat and improvise many kinds of depression and are proven successful. Since they are cost and patient-friendly, portable, and provide similar therapeutic effects as medications, they would do wonders for depressive patients, especially those who can’t take any other treatment.