Dr. Katie Deming [00:00:00]:
What can elite athletes who train at high altitudes teach us about improving our health and longevity? Today, I sit down with doctor Ark Prokopov, an expert in the field of mitochondrial function and hypoxia. As a graduate of the Moscow Medical Institute, Ark worked as an emergency physician You'll learn how You'll learn how intermittent hypoxic training can be applied not only for prevention and antiaging, but also as a complimentary treatment for Lyme disease and even cancer. Stay until the end as ARC shares practical tips on how you can incorporate hypoxic training into your daily life. Let's dive in. You're listening to the Born to Heal podcast, and I'm your host, doctor Katie Deming. After 2 decades of practicing as an oncologist and caring for thousands of patients, I've seen firsthand how our healthcare system places obstacles in your path to true healing. My guests and I will bridge the worlds of western medicine and alternative healing to help you achieve optimal health. Expect to uncover new insights, share a few laughs, and maybe even shed some tears along the way.Dr. Katie Deming [00:01:14]:
But most of all, we'll learn how to heal from within together. So let's dive into today's episode. I am thrilled today to be joined by Ark Prokopov, who is joining us from Mallorca, Spain. And I wanted to invite Ark on the show because of his expertise in mitochondrial function and hypoxia, specifically. So tell us, hypoxic training, what is the benefit? How does this work? What do people need to know about this? Just as a fundamental, like, they never heard of this before.Ark Prokopov [00:01:52]:
Right.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:01:52]:
How do you explain that?

Ark Prokopov [00:01:54]:
No. On the one hand, everybody, especially a physician, when it hears term hypoxia, it's like a red flag. Yeah. Because hypoxia, it's a it's a pathological state which develops in acute and chronic conditions, such as in infarction or stroke or some blood loss. Yeah. It's many pathological events, they result in tissue and cellular hypoxia. It's clear that it it's it has some very, very serious damaging effect. On the other hand, we find hypoxic state or very low oxygen content during normal physical activities.

Ark Prokopov [00:02:38]:
As we stress our muscles, the blood flow is blocked, and the muscles experience intermittent hypoxia. Yeah. Because we contract and relax our muscles, The same is in our heart. Yeah. Heart contracts and depresses the blood vessels, coronary vessels, and that's intermittent hypoxia. It's all measured by, specific methods. Yeah? Moreover, the development of embryo in uterus starts with very, very low level of oxygen. It's about the same values like on the Mount Everest, on the top of Everest.

Ark Prokopov [00:03:17]:
And only very slow during embryonic development, it grows, grows, and grows. And then just before the delivery, it is still twice lower than in room air. So hypoxia is very important. It's a regional state of of origination of life on our planet. And therefore, just adaptation to low higher level of oxygen, it's a huge biochemical work. It's adaptation of enzymes. It's adaptation of oxygen absorbing, transporting, and metabolizing systems. And adaptation to hypoxia brings a lot of benefits, specifically for prevention of many diseases, such as cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure, and even, cancer growth.

Ark Prokopov [00:04:12]:
Yeah? And it can be used also as a complementary treatment by a range of diseases and conditions. And, also, it is very efficient in rehabilitation programs. Currently, we, for instance, we have very good result with rehabilitation of post COVID patients, long haulers, yeah, COVID long haulers, and also with chronic fatigue syndrome, myalgic encephalomyelitis. So it's a really a broad scale of applications.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:04:45]:
And can you explain what's happening and and how this is benefiting these different conditions, both in prevention and also in complementary treatments and and rehab?

Ark Prokopov [00:04:58]:
Most important target of intermittent hypoxia is the mitochondria. On the other hand, it is long ago, it is known that, hypoxic treatment or altitude training, as all athletes know. It, stimulates production of red blood cells. It improves oxygen, oxygen metabolism. It improves iron metabolism. So iron is better absorbed from nutrition, from food, and the red blood cells better synthesized, and hemoglobin has better value, better quality. It is very well known. But it's the only small part of the very bright spectrum of hypoxic applications, action of hypoxia.

Ark Prokopov [00:05:44]:
Because intermittent oxygen oscillations, which happens during this intermittent hypoxic training, they target mitochondria. Mitochondria work in very low normally, physiologically, they work in quite low level of oxygen. It's about 7, Torr, also millimeter of, pix silver. Torr, we we call it shortly. Yeah. And all mitochondria in the cells, they work at very low oxygen pressure normally. Yeah. This is necessary for their fine biochemistry to keep their structure undamaged.

Ark Prokopov [00:06:25]:
But mitochondria also undergo very accelerated damage because burning fuel in using oxygen, it's a pretty aggressive chemical biochemical reaction. A lot of, free oxygen radicals develop from this process, and they damage mitochondrial membranes. They damage mitochondrial DNA, which is mutated much, more intensive than nuclear DNA. And as a result, mitochondria undergo continuously extensive damage. But mitochondria in the single cells, they are imprisoned there. So if part of mitochondria will be damaged, you cannot replace them with healthy mitochondria. Yeah. And this evolution of mitochondria in the cell, it run it's running continuously from our birth to our the problem is that damaged mitochondria have shorter DNA, mitochondrial DNA.

Ark Prokopov [00:07:29]:
And when they exist in the closed volume of the cell, they compete with healthy mitochondrial DNA with undamaged so called wild type mitochondrial DNA. And here's the problem. Mitochondrial DNA, first of all, it has a ring structure. Yeah. Normally, we have nuclear DNA. It has this very prolonged, like, a spiral structure. But mitochondrial DNA, because they're of bacterial origin, they have a ring structure. And damaged mutations, they result in a smaller size of mitochondrial DNA because they just they repair themselves very insufficiently.

Ark Prokopov [00:08:11]:
They just cut piece of this ring, and then they glue the ends together, and each repair step results in the smaller and smaller rings. And now the problem. In a cell, when there is a stable conditions, a lot of nutrition, all necessary nutrients, enough oxygen, What molecules will make their copies faster? The smaller molecules. Therefore, we see with the growing age accumulation of mutated damaged mitochondria in the cells, specifically in long living cells, like neurons, like heart cardiomyocytes. These cells, they are most they have the pro the longest lifespan in our body because many cells are just replaced, but neurons are never replaced. Yeah. And we see the phenomenon of clonal expansion expansion of mutated mitochondrial DNA. And this phenomenon underlies aging process, many degenerative chronic degenerative processes, chronic inflammatory processes, immune aging.

Ark Prokopov [00:09:22]:
So it's a universal underlying phenomenon. How can you contradict this process? It's a natural process. Yeah. Because it can be accelerated by, infection. It can be accelerated by intoxications. But it happens just because we we live, we eat, and we consume oxygen. How can we influence this process? Very simple. Instead of continuous delivery of oxygen and nutrients, we can use intermittent delivery.

Ark Prokopov [00:09:55]:
We can use intermittent flow of nutrients, which is very well recognized now as intermittent fasting with many variants like, fasting mimicking diets and so on. It's very popular now. But the same can be done with oxygen. We can deliver oxygen intermittently. So, first, lower than it is 21% we have in the room air, but we can deliver, for instance, 10%, twice lower oxygen. Then after after a certain time, we deliver a room air concentration 21% or even higher, say 30% oxygen. So on the cellular level, inside the mitochondria, instead of, of flat line, we we get oscillations. And these oscillations are critical mechanism which works as a mitochondrial destructive control.

Ark Prokopov [00:10:54]:
Yeah. Destructive testing. Because healthy mitochondria and damaged mitochondrial DNA, they easily go through these oscillations because they have protective mechanisms. They have anti enzymatic antioxidants, like superoxide dismutase, catalase, peroxidase. But mutated mitochondria, they lack these protective qualities, and they destroy themselves. They just will be eliminated during and because of these oxygen oscillations. So after several cycles of such interventions, we see mitochondrial populations are improved. We see significantly less amount of mutated mitochondrial DNA, and we see all the functional qualities of the cell, they are much higher.

Ark Prokopov [00:11:45]:
So it's authentic biological rejuvenation process. Therefore, this method, actually, it's a fundamental antiaging method. Yeah. Mhmm. And I introduced this in many scientific conferences. First time I presented it in bio gerontological conferences in 2008 in Cambridge. Aubrey de Grey invited me. But, since then, I tried it, in many fields which are lacking efficient interventions.

Ark Prokopov [00:12:20]:
The first was Lyme disease. I had very promising results with Lyme patients, with chronic Lyme disease. Yeah. Neuroberelliosis, including. So I I published the book. It's available in Amazon, Undoing Lyme Disease. And I I have now more than 200 patients who were suffering for decades with chronic Lyme, they are free from Lyme. Using this protocol, using a combination of intermittent hypoxic training plus dietary correction, yeah, because in the in the no.

Ark Prokopov [00:13:00]:
It it's different different for different people. And, of course, some individualized supplementation, we can achieve stable improvement and, I hope, cure from in in most cases.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:13:13]:
Wow. And so, basically, you're pruning away the defective mitochondria, improving the population so that then the body is able to deal with the burden of disease on its own.

Ark Prokopov [00:13:25]:
Exactly. Because, exactly, bacterial Lyme disease. One of the pathogenetic mechanism is the systemic damage of mitochondria and immune cells, which are unable to fight Borrelia because Borrelia, they can hide themselves intracellular as around the bodies. So it's a it's a huge problem. But in any way, mitochondria are the key players in all these steps of, Lyme development because some people don't develop Lyme even they have they were beaten many times by ticks. They got a lot of Borrelia and co infections, but they don't develop Lyme because their immune system is powerful. They they have, very powerful mitochondria. The other people, they can have, you know, just a little bit weaker mitochondria, even so called mitochondrial polymorphism, which is actually not pathologic, but it is a little bit more susceptible to such kind of infections like Lyme.

Ark Prokopov [00:14:33]:
Yeah. And therefore, they develop primary chronic Lyme because their immunity tolerates them. But as we start improving mitochondrial population, we make them more aggressive. Mitochondrial produce more energy, and immune system turns to be more powerful and more aggressive against intruders. It's one component. The other component, oxygen oscillations are not comfortable for for Borrelia themselves because spirochetes, they are so called micro arrow fields, and they hide themselves in hypoxic niches in our body. And these hypoxic niches are cartilage tendons, and we have also some hypoxic niches even in the brain. Antibiotic can come there, cannot penetrate because the concentration is very low.

Ark Prokopov [00:15:25]:
On the other hand, antibiotics, they also have damaging effect on mitochondria because mitochondria are bacterial origin, a vicious circle develops. More antibiotics, more damage for immunity, but you cannot eliminate Borrelia because they are hidden in hypoxic niches. But when we start changing oxygen concentration in these hypoxic niches, this is very disturbing for Borrelia because they need stability for proliferation, for multiplication. And therefore, I observe in my patients that after many sessions of hypoxic treatment, they start improving continuously. And step by step, they get relief from all their problems which are so devastating for most chronic Lyme disease patients.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:16:20]:
Absolutely. Wow. So and what is the protocol like? What is you know, how many times a week are they doing this training? What is the time frame of how how does that work?

Ark Prokopov [00:16:30]:
It depends, of course, on the on the actual actual physical state of the patient because some patients are so exhausted after years of fighting with Lyme, and they are extremely sensitive also to oxygen flex oscillations. They cannot tolerate deep oscillations, so you need to start very individually. I test patients, first of all, to the resistance of hypoxia, how they react on the sessions. Anyway, it can be done it should be done very individually. As a generic protocol, it it's about 4 3 to 5 sessions a week. Each session continues for about half an hour till maybe 1 hour. And oxygen oscillations shall be controlled. The we can use we can use special devices, yeah, to to control, hemoglobin saturation.

Ark Prokopov [00:17:25]:
So it's like pulse oximeter, but with the Bluetooth connection to smartphone.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:17:31]:
And how long, like, would someone do this treatment for? Is it, you know, for months or weeks or

Ark Prokopov [00:17:38]:
years? Yeah. Very important questions. At the beginning, I've seen improvement even after 10 or 20 sessions. But this improvement didn't last long because, you know, it's just the initiation of the complete process. And, therefore, I started to prolong the treatments. Instead of 10 sessions or 20 sessions, then a break for a couple of week or even for 1 month, then again and it turned to be that most efficient way when a patient does it at home. Devices, they should belong to a sleeping room. There's no nothing exceptional or strange because athletes do the same.

Ark Prokopov [00:18:22]:
Athletes, when they prepare for competition, they sleep in a hypoxic tent, or they use these protocols for improving their, endurance. And, it it can be done, you know, during months. Now I see that it's really efficient when a patient has device just in sleeping room, and they do, let's say, 3 to 6 sessions a week. And they do it for months months with interruptions, let's say, till 4 weeks. Maybe you somebody's, going to vacation or some some other things. But many months of this continuous protocol practically guarantee stable improvement or even cure.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:19:08]:
Wow. That's incredible. And can for people who don't have Lyme disease, who are looking to prevent illness and boost their mitochondrial health, is this something that people can use in a preventive fashion? I know you talked about that in the beginning, but I'm kinda wondering about that.

Ark Prokopov [00:19:25]:
Absolutely. Absolutely. If the natural degradation of mitochondria is just, you know, programmed in the in the in the, in our evolution, then if we slow down this process, it has only beneficial positive side effects. I have, many patients for this last 30 years. They use this protocol continuously, and, I don't see any negative consequences. Of course, I myself use it. Some people ask, oh, what if you overdose? Can you overuse it, overdose this? Yes. Of course.

Ark Prokopov [00:20:03]:
Like any training, if you go to a gym, let's say, 7 days a week, and you sleep there for 1 hour, it will be definitely overdosing. It will be overtrained. So there is an optimal range, and people find out this optimal range. Of course, I help them to find it out. Yeah. But there is also a excellent example in the nature. Because in the nature, we have some species which show exceptional longevity and exceptional healthy lifespan. And the world champion is bowhead whale.

Ark Prokopov [00:20:39]:
Yeah. These huge animals, they live in the polar region over the polar circle. Yeah. Other whales, they come to the north only in the summertime because it's extremely rich production of, fish and, all this stuff which they eat. But, in in wintertime, they all go lower to the equator for for proliferation. But bowhead whales, they spent all their life there over the polar cycle. And that means that they eat a lot during 6 summer months, and then 6 months in winter, they eat 0. This is continue so, so called intermittent fasting with this special protocol.

Ark Prokopov [00:21:24]:
But, also, they continuously dive, yeah, from birth to the end of their lives. And diving is intermittent hypoxic training. When scientists found out that the oldest oldest of the old bowhead whale was 211 years old. It was a shock for the scientific community. By the way, I was one of the first who published this in, 2008. Yeah. I just summarized all these studies and explained that it is the result of continuous improvement of the mitochondrial quality of these animals. Because combination of such powerful fasting with continuous hypoxic training, it keeps their mitochondria in the best possible way, in the best possible state.

Ark Prokopov [00:22:17]:
And also important thing, in more than 350, whales were out of seed because when they when the Aborigines, they killed the whale. They cut it. They eat it. Actually, it was their original way of, hunting. And, veterinary physicians, they participated in this. And in these 350 autopsies, they found only few cancers, only 3 or 4 cancers without any metastasizing. And this is shocking because with this huge lifespan and this huge body mass, there should be much more cancer tumors as we see in land animals. But these animals, they're exceptionally protected against cancers.

Ark Prokopov [00:23:04]:
So I think this is the summary of many evolutionary adaptations, which which result in this exceptionally long healthy lifespan and exceptional quality of their mitochondria. And hypoxic training is a significant part of these adaptations.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:23:21]:
Yeah. And, well, it's so interesting to see that, you know, example in nature that that clearly demonstrates these 2, the intermittent fasting and then also the intermittent hypoxia together. I'm wondering if we could talk a little bit about cancer, and I know that you do work in hypoxia as a complimentary treatment for cancer. And then also, maybe after that, we can talk about it as it relates to radiation because you have some powerful, you know, data around the use of hypoxia during radiation as well.

Ark Prokopov [00:23:53]:
Oh, yes. Yes. Of course. First of all, to to my experience, I and I have more than 30 years experience in this field, I can say that hypoxic training may have a significant protective effect against cancer development. Just it can be explained just because beta mitochondria, it means better anticancer immunity, inborn native anticancer defense, and better apoptosis because, mitochondria play very important role in apoptosis also in cancer cells. But on the other hand, hypoxic training doesn't influence evolution of cancer which already existed in in the body. I've seen some patients who developed cancer, and the application of hypoxic training, only hypoxic training, had no significant influence on the progression of cancer. So it didn't it didn't stop cancer.

Ark Prokopov [00:24:54]:
It may be slowed down, but, definitely, it is never accelerated cancer. This what what is from my, I would say, small experience because I'm not oncologist. On the other hand, application of, hypoxic training in complementary anticancer protocols and treatments like combination with diet, with, of course, intermittent fasting and using some supplements, definitely, it has it has a great value.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:25:26]:
Is the concept there is basically you're having improve you know, will you explain that? That basically, that there's better cancer immunity if you're boosting the mitochondrial function, and it plays a role in the immune system and then also apoptosis. So it's interesting, though, that on its own, you're saying it doesn't. So in intermittent hypoxia alone for cancer, it doesn't make it worse, but it doesn't make it better. But when you combine it with diet or intermittent fasting and then supplements, there is a benefit.

Ark Prokopov [00:26:00]:
Yeah. Because the anticancer anticancer immunity in our body, it's a it's a it's a powerful mechanism which was developed during 1,000,000 and millions, 100 of 1000000 years of evolution. Multicellularity, it's the first opportunity to to appear for cancer at all because unicellular organism, they don't develop cancer. And many cells which are specialized, this is the first invitation of cancer possibility. Yeah? And, therefore, during 100 of 1000000 years of evolution, our bodies, our genome developed powerful anticancer defense mechanisms. And all these mechanisms, they rely in on mitochondria also because mitochondria, as a preventive, mitochondrial free oxygen radicals, they are the weapon which our immunity uses against all invaders, viruses, bacteria, and also from inner invaders like cancer cells. So more healthy, more energetic, more robust mitochondria, it's better chance better chances to prevent cancer and also fight cancer.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:27:15]:
Got it. And can you speak to the role with radiation?

Ark Prokopov [00:27:21]:
With radiation. Yeah. It's very, very interesting story because the first, notice that, ischemia can protect from radiational damage was known actually from the very beginning when x rays were developed. X rays were found in Germany. Yeah. And the first experiments showed that if you just, you know, create ischemic region So for instance, you just clip the skin that its blow blood flow is reduced, and then x rays cannot significantly damage such ischemic regions. Much later, it was recognized that the oxygen is the player, most important player. So if you just reduce oxygen in in an organism which is which undergoes irradiation, then it, it becomes much less oxidative and irradiated damage.

Ark Prokopov [00:28:21]:
Yeah. So and this becomes very important during cancer radiation treatment because the many problems of the radiation cancer radiation treatment originate from, collateral damage of healthy tissues. So it would be, for instance, very efficient just to increase radiation doses a little bit higher and tumor will be better suppressed or even eradicated. But the same time, you got more collateral damage for healthy tissues and this is like a rigid circle. But if we reduce oxygen partial pressure in the tissue, healthy tissues will be immediately much better protected against the radiation, but not the tumor because tumors are already hypoxic. Oxygen partial pressure in the tumor is much, much lower than in the surrounding tissues. So tumors, they just don't feel this small reduction of oxygen, which is efficient for healthy tissues. But for tumor, it's like small, drop of water on the hot stone.

Ark Prokopov [00:29:31]:
They don't feel it. So you can increase irradiation doses up to 20, 25% without incurring additional collateral damage for healthy tissues.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:29:44]:
Yep. So this this is fascinating just because of my career as a radiation oncologist. The limitation of delivering radiation, like you described, is the normal tissue tolerance. So we want to give as much dose into the tumor with up to what the normal tissues will tolerate. So and that depends on the organ that we're treating. So in the, you know, bowel, it's like, you know, 45 gray. And Mhmm. Different tissues, basically, so people understand this.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:30:14]:
Different organs in the body have different normal tissue tolerances. Meaning that we can't give more radiation than what the normal tissue will tolerate because otherwise, we will kill that organ or cause so much damage that it basically negates the benefits of killing the cancer cells in that area. And so what you're describing is that you're basically we're now increasing the normal tissue tolerance so we can give more dose to the tumor with less damage to their surrounding tissues, which ultimately gives us, like, a better therapeutic window

Ark Prokopov [00:30:48]:
Yes.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:30:49]:
To be able to deliver dose. Absolutely. So and, yeah, dose escalation is something that we look at. You know, when people ask this is one of the questions that people would always ask me as a radiation oncologist was how do you determine, like, you know, doses are standardized is because of the normal tissue tolerance. There have been studies done looking at how much can you give to the normal tissues. And that's why for a particular type of cancer, there's gonna be a specific protocol and certain dose that we give. And and don't go past that or don't go under that. Because one of the things that people don't understand is there's like, well, why don't you give me half the dose? And you're like, well, the problem is not the the problem is we wanna give as much dose to the cancer cells because we know the cancer cells need a certain dose to be killed, but it's the normal cells damage that we can't over we can't surpass.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:31:46]:
And so if we gave you half the dose, you basically would get side effects associated with the normal tissue, but not the benefit of killing the cancer cells. And so I love what you're describing is because, basically, it's allowing us to give higher doses, which is ultimately what the tumors require with the minimizing the damage. So in this protocol so for people who are having radiation, what does that look like? Is it the same thing that they would do it in their bedroom that have the, equipment to do that over time while they're having radiation or or delivered during the radiation?

Ark Prokopov [00:32:19]:
Mostly, in a in unit where the radiation equipment is. So it is done in this in the, radio oncology centers. But instead of breathing room air during radiation, they breathe oxygen reduced air. For instance, 10%, even 9%, even 8% of oxygen. If, it is it is pretty intensive hypoxia, but for most of, patients, if they are relaxed in this in this during treatment, if they don't do physical activity, just lying and relaxing, it's safe. It it doesn't produce any hypoxic, specifically effect of, you know, hypoxia, like dangerous for brain, for the heart. It's a lot of clinical studies. I can send you articles.

Ark Prokopov [00:33:10]:
I have many articles which done on dozens and many, many cases of patients, and all protocols are described.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:33:18]:
And so, basically, through the treatment, which for people who don't know a radiation treatments, like, you know, the beam on time is quite short, but an appointment is only, like, 15 minutes. Do they do it the duration of the time that the patient is in the room having the treatment, or is it only when the beam is on? Do you know the specifics of that?

Ark Prokopov [00:33:37]:
Important is that during the beam is on, there should be already lower oxygen partial pressure in the in the area. Yeah. So to to to achieve this, you need to start hypoxic inhalation, let's say, 10 minutes before irradiation starts. And then it should be stopped after, let's say, 5 minutes after irradiation stopped. So it's a window. It can it depends, of course, how long the irradiation continues, but it can be, let's say, 10 minutes, 4 5 minutes after the the whole hypoxic session. I I I don't I don't remember details. They're all described in the articles I can send to you.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:34:19]:
Yeah. I'd love to see the studies. That would be excellent. So and and this is used way so where are you seeing this used with hypoxia during radiation? Because in the US, I'm I'm not seeing that.

Ark Prokopov [00:34:31]:
Yeah. I have. It started in the former Soviet Union in seventies in 19 seventies. Then it was, it was widely published in in the in the in all the countries which were, you know, like, under in the in this coalition of, Soviet Union. It was a lot of work done in Germany, in East Germany, so far as I know, and many publications originate from there. But, then I don't know for what reasons, it was kind of, you know, neglected. We know that many, many breakthrough treatments, they are a bit neglected from the conventional medicine for many reasons. Yeah? But, nevertheless, I think that this intervention is so simple and efficient, and it can reduce so much of side effects of radiation treatment that it should be used.

Ark Prokopov [00:35:32]:
It should be used. And if you if you can start it in the US, that will be a great help for many patients.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:35:39]:
Yeah. No. I love that. And this is, you know, I this is the first time that I've really explored this idea of hypoxia during radiation. I was never taught that during training. We're I was taught about hyperthermia Yeah. You know, as a radiation sense.

Ark Prokopov [00:35:54]:
But There is there there were attempt to potentiate radio radium, radiation effect even with hyperbaric oxygen, with hyperoxygenation, with the constructive idea that the more free radicals, the more damage for the tumor. But it turned to be double edged sword, also more damage for the healthy tissue. And in contrast, hypoxic treatment doesn't provide this. It reduces all the negative effects of, radiation. So I I think it has a great potential. And because also it is so simple to induce, it's even simpler than hyperbaric oxygenation.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:36:36]:
Absolutely. Yeah. And the and with the radiation, though, it's not intermittent. It's basically you're bringing it down and keeping it starting 10 minutes before and then through the treatment 5 minutes after. It's basically continuous at that 10, 9, or 8 percent oxygen. Okay. Great. So I think, you know, the one thing as I'm listening to you talk, this this is fascinating for me.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:36:58]:
So thank you so much for being here. Absolutely. But I think, you know, people may be wondering, like, say that I don't if you have a medical condition, obviously, you're gonna need a doctor's supervision to do this. But in prevention and you said that there are commercially available, you know, units that do this. Can you speak about how someone who is healthy you know, what are the units that are available and and what is what would someone like that need to do in order to be able to incorporate intermittent hypoxia in a safe way into their life?

Ark Prokopov [00:37:29]:
Oh, very simple. You need to think about yourself like an athlete. All high level athletes, professional athletes, they know about altitude training. They use altitude training. They're sleeping in a tent. They use also intermittent hypoxic training, which are introduced, by the way, in the United States in 2000 from 2000 to 2004. I was just introducing this for athletes in the United States. So everybody of us is an athlete.

Ark Prokopov [00:38:00]:
We run our marathon. Yeah. And this is our healthy lifespan. If you train for the good results, you win. If you do not train, you lose. And training for healthy lifespan, it is definitely improving quality of your mitochondria. Because if you don't do this, they degrade automatically. So using altitude training, which is a rather primitive form of hypoxic training, it's already a good thing.

Ark Prokopov [00:38:31]:
But sleeping in a in a tent, it's, it has many negative effects because, you know, it's turned. You need to keep machine running through the night. It's pretty noisy. It consumes electricity. But intermittent hypoxic training is much simpler. You breathing you inhale oxygen through the mask, then you just, relaxing, mask on your face, and you many people just fall asleep. And the machine intermittently delivers oxygen depleted, hypoxic air, then normoxic, or even slightly hyperoxic air, and it's all supported by biofeedback. So pulse oximeter sends your oxygen saturation and heart rate and controls the protocol, computer controlled protocols.

Ark Prokopov [00:39:20]:
These are highest level machines. We manufacture such machines. I have the company in Bulgaria which is manufacturing these machines. And there are medical equipment, medical grade mid equipment for intermittent hypoxic training, which is produced in Germany. Also, with with my participation, we started it in 2004. And now there are 2 companies, available. If, somebody is really interested, they can take a look at my website, which is oxiesta.com. Oxy like oxygen, ester like yeah.

Ark Prokopov [00:40:05]:
So it's very simple to find. Yeah. And also, in my book, Undoing Lyme Disease, I also describe generic protocols and give some tips for searching for equipment. So it's not a rocket science.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:40:20]:
I love that. And with the if someone had a personal device at home, you you know, the is the duration still like a 30 minute treatment? Is is is it typically around that? Or

Ark Prokopov [00:40:33]:
Usually, if, if somebody already has intermittent hypoxic normobaric intermittent hypoxic training device at home, it's, reasonable let's say, do it 4 to 6 times a week. Yeah. Duration, half an hour till, let's say, 45 minutes. And saturation shall not be shall not go lower than, let's say, 75%. But it's very generic protocol. It's for healthy people for prevention.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:41:05]:
Yeah. No. And that I wanted to clarify that from when I said before is, like, this is not for treatment. This would be just for people because I, you know, a lot of what I'm wanting to help people learn is, you know, we can insulate ourselves from illness. And I love that you described that we're all athletes. And I was a semiprofessional athlete before I went to medical school and was training at the US Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, and we would go train there specifically for the reason, but this was before your time. So, like, 94 or something. But I love that idea is that, you know, we are athletes.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:41:40]:
And if we don't take care of our bodies, you know, this is the way that we win the race is by looking at the ways that we can really improve the function of ourselves and the mitochondria are crucial. This is just coming out in every area that mitochondria are tied to you know every chronic disease that we're seeing, including cancer so. Thank you so much for being here with us today. And what can you give us you just gave us the oxygenesta.com website. Is that the website that people should go to if they're interested, or is there another website that you would like to drive?

Ark Prokopov [00:42:13]:
I can send you some links. I can I will send you articles about the application of hypoxic intervention in radiation treatment? So this is this is not not difficult.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:42:25]:
Perfect. So we'll include those links in the show notes. So thank you, Ark. It, truly, it's been a pleasure having you on the show. Thank you so much for being here.

Ark Prokopov [00:42:32]:
My pleasure. Thank you for having me.

Dr. Katie Deming [00:42:38]:
Thank you for joining me on Born to Heal. It's been a privilege to share this time with you, and I hope that today's episode has offered you valuable insights on your journey toward optimal health. Please consider subscribing, sharing this podcast with your friends, and leaving us a review. To learn more about how you can work with me, please visit katiedemming.com. You can find additional resources in the episode show notes linked below, and remember to join us next week as we continue to explore more holistic approaches to healing. Until then, this is doctor Katie Deming reminding you that just like me, you were born to heal.