Chronic refractory osteomyelitis is an inflammatory reaction normally caused by a bacterial infection with inadequate blood supply involving bone.  Some people fail to heal with proper surgical and antibiotic therapy (usually a four-to-six-week course) classifying their inflammatory bone disease as “chronic refractory osteomyelitis” per the Cierny-Mader protocols. This triggers a patient’s candidacy for adjunctive hyperbaric oxygen therapy covered by Medicare and most third-party insurances.

For patients with osteomyelitis lingering greater than six weeks with traditional treatment modalities, they benefit from adding hyperbaric oxygen therapy to the regimen by its ability to:

• Help boost resistance to infection by increasing the amount of oxygen delivered to tissue and bone to limit the spread and progression of infection.

• Oxygenate the bone cells (osteocytes, osteoblasts and osteoclasts) to help heal the bone.

• Help the infection-fighting white blood cells do their job by killing the bacteria that thrive in low-oxygen (hypoxic) areas.

• Work synergistically with nutritional support, surgical debridement and reconstruction and to help certain antibiotics get across bacterial cell walls more effectively.

WHEN TO CALL HYOX:

• After six weeks of no or limited success with traditional treatment methods.