Dr. Harch's primary interests are hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) and SPECT brain imaging indexed neuro-rehabilitation, spanning the entire spectrum of neurological disease.

In 1990, Dr. Harch began treating divers who had chronic residual neurological effects of cerebral decompression illness. While treating them with HBOT, he indexed their treatment and neurological improvements to high resolution SPECT brain imaging. The success with these divers led to the application of HBOT to patients with other chronic neurological disorders. In 1992 he pioneered the application of low pressure HBOT & SPECT brain imaging to the first cerebral palsy child and in 1996 to one of the first autism spectrum children in North America.

The SPECT brain imaging on his patients is legendary and referenced by a library of 85 neurologically normal patients that were recruited and scanned by Dr. Harch at West Jefferson Medical Center. His patients' SPECT brain scans have been featured in multiple editions of the Textbook of Hyperbaric Medicine and at congressional hearings. (Copies of the scans and clinical vignettes of over 20 patients presented in the congressional proceedings, including the first ever treated Alzheimer's patient, can be viewed on the International Hyperbaric Medical Association Website at: www.hyperbaricmedicalassociation.org). K.K. Jain, the Swiss neurosurgeon and hyperbaric author/expert once proclaimed, "Dr. Harch has pictures (brain scans) no one else in the world has." The SPECT brain imaging unequivocally documents the beneficial effects of HBOT in a multitude of patients with diverse neuropathologies, including stroke, trauma, pediatric neurological disorders, toxic brain injury, carbon monoxide poisoning, chronic fatigue, etc.

Multiple Centers and studies have also confirmed Dr. Harch's breakthrough results with neurologically impaired children (Montgomery 1999, Barrett 1999, Collet 2001, Packard 2000,Golden and Neubauer 2002, Waalkes 2002, Sethi 2004, and others) and additional centers are reporting the same experience in adult neurological conditions. [All of these studies are discussed in the article Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy in Cerebral Palsy and Pediatric Neurology: A Scientific Perspective. Exceptional Parent Magazine, June, 2004; 34(6)].

Due to his expertise and unparalleled success in both animal and human research, Dr. Harch is now recognized as a scientific expert and one of the foremost authorities in the United States on the use of HBOT and SPECT brain imaging for neurological conditions.

The obvious effects of HBOT treatment can be seen if only a few sessions.

“Normal” scan of a 26-year-old woman

1991 pretreatment scan

After 40 HBOT treatments

After 80 HBOT treatments