COUNSELOR USES BIOFEEDBACK INSTEAD OF DRUGS

JACKSON -- Andrew Leonard's waiting room looks like any other counselor's -- chairs along the walls and copies of "Psychology Today" and "Longevity" stacked on the tables.

It is the treatment room that is different. There's a special chair with speakers on the headrest, and the music that plays through them is designed to relax the listener.

Leonard sits at a computer, reading the beta and theta waves tracked by the sensors on his patient's head. The computer tells him how relaxed his patient is, how tense his muscles are, how much sweat his palms are producing.

All the information is part of Leonard's biofeedback program, which teaches clients how to control their problems by reading their body's signals.

"This kind of treatment gives people control of themselves," Leonard said. "It doesn't rely on drugs, which may have dangerous side effects and the potential of addiction."

He holds a master's degree in psychological counseling from Southeast Missouri State University and plans to get his doctorate. When Leonard began practicing in 1984, he tried all the traditional therapies to treat people with mental problems. Non-traditional treatments, like hypnosis and later biofeedback, attracted him because of the speed and effectiveness he saw in them.

Leonard compares biofeedback to stepping on scales. Just as the scales will tell someone when he is eating too much, an electroencephalogram reading will tell him other physiological information. When the patient knows the information, he can work to change it.

The counselor said he began studying biofeedback a year ago so he could apply it to children with attention deficit disorder. The label is often stuck on children who daydream in class or are hyper and disruptive.

Neurologists discovered that ADD children's brains don't produce the normal amount of beta waves. When chemical transmitters in the human brain fire quickly because of intense concentration, beta waves result. When the transmitters are slower, the brain produces alpha or theta waves, and the person isn't as focused.

Leonard believes that ADD children don't produce enough beta waves to keep themselves occupied, so they daydream, talk or act in other disruptive ways.

"I was a daydreamer," he said. "Of course, they didn't have any term like attention deficit disorder when I was in school, so I got in all kinds of trouble for my behavior."

Leonard most recently attended a biofeedback seminar in Florida, where he worked with ADD children. During the 10 day-seminar, he saw results.

Let the traditional skeptics say what they will, he said.

"A lot of MDs were at that seminar, looking for alternative therapies," Leonard said. "I've had good results with biofeedback on myself and with my clients."

One of his clients, Stephen Campbell, uses biofeedback to control pain. Campbell was in a near-fatal car accident 20 years ago. Years later, a tree fell on him.

The accidents left him with pain in his neck, shoulders and head. He sought traditional therapy first, receiving operations and using injected painkillers. Later, his medical doctor suggested he try biofeedback.

"Sure, I was skeptical, but I had nothing to lose," said Campbell, a real-estate manager and salesman. "I could either try biofeedback or be doped up all the time."

After three weeks in treatment, Campbell said he sees a difference in his ability to control pain. Leonard taught him to tense up and then relax, so that relaxation eventually will become automatic.

"I was told not to expect any sudden results, but I feel better," Campbell said. "You know how stressful the holidays are. I had to go to my in-laws, but I still felt better than I had in a long time."