If you believe Jeff Dobkin, there is a time-buying procedure to delay brain damage in heart attack victims.  The technique takes under a minute to initiate.  A child can do it.  It can be explained on the phone.  It can even be self-administered. 

    Dobkin’s technique is to initiate the “diving reflex,” an oxygen conserving reflex found in all mammals.  If someone close to you has a heart attack, Dobkin thinks the choice to initiate the diving reflex should be yours.  The procedure is introduced at the time of the emergency to reduce the chance of brain death, and extend the time it takes before irreversible brain damage occurs. 

    Dobkin feels the technique should be a known choice to everyone.  “Anyone who has had the terror of seeing a loved one, friend, or child stop breathing should know this simple technique that may save their life.”

Background

    Over 20 years ago Jeff Dobkin read a short article in Newsweek about Brian Cunningham, a young boy who fell into an icy cold river and drowned.  For over half an hour Brian was completely submerged under the frigid water.  Long before they pulled his lifeless body out, he had stopped breathing, and his heart had stopped.  By any measure, when he was retrieved from the icy water, he was dead.

    The boy went on to be resuscitated and revived.  Current theory stated the onset of irreversible brain damage starts to occur within four minutes of oxygen deprivation to the brain.  In apparent defiance to this theory, Brian Cunningham suffered no brain damage.  Jeff Dobkin wondered why.  And for whatever reason, could the same reaction that saved this child be triggered in other people? 

    Infants with SIDS.  Drowning victims.  Electrocution victims.  Suffocation.  Drug overdose.  Trauma.  Dobkin thinks when used by itself, or in conjunction with CPR, this technique of triggering the diving reflex is a time-buying procedure that will delay the onset of brain damage to any of these victims.

Already in use, by nature, in all mammals

    In nature, the diving reflex is used every day to delay brain death.  Diving lizards are able to stay under water for such long periods - up to an hour - when the diving reflex is triggered.  Ducks which can stay under water without drowning for about seven minutes can survive three times as long, when the diving reflex is triggered by a cold water dive.  Nature’s own trigger: cold water to the face.  This reflex is nature’s own way to delay the death of people and animals who fall in icy water. 

    “I believe the technique of initiating the diving reflex in a time of emergency can be used as a time-buying procedure to delay brain death in heart attack victims.  It has evolved as a safety device over hundreds of thousands of years.  An entire range of animals use this reflex as a natural defense against brain damage and death when they fall into water - including man.”  Dobkin’s technique makes the body trigger its own natural defense for survival when oxygen is withheld.
 
    What is the issue Mr. Dobkin is fighting so hard to get known? 
It is a triggering of the “Mammalian Diving Reflex,” also called the “Diving Reflex,” or “Oxygen Conserving Reflex.”  It is a natural, lifesaving reflex found in all mammals. 

    Dobkin’s theory to save lives is simply to initiate the body’s
own natural defense by triggering the diving reflex in an emergency. 
To delay brain damage in children stricken with SIDS.  To help delay brain death of suffocation victims, and victims of drug overdose.  Electrocution, trauma, accident victims - this reflex may provide a margin of extra safety any time a person stops breathing. 

    Imagine this: you just came into your child's bedroom to tuck her in good night.  Her lips are blue.  Her face cool.  And her body is limp in your arms.  Your child lies there not breathing.  What do you do?  If you think this is the most horrible of situations, Dobkin couldn’t agree more.  “As the parent of a young child, this would be without a doubt the most horrifying, terrifying experience of my life.  I would think any possible help at this time would be very welcome.  Without initiating this simple oxygen-conserving reflex, if you don’t know infant CPR, your only option is to watch your child lie there not breathing, until help arrives.”

Here’s Dobkin’s Technique.  This one paragraph may save your life:

    In any event that stops the supply of oxygen to the brain - such as heart attack, drowning, suffocation, electrocution, drug overdose, trauma, SIDS, or any of dozens of other life-threatening occurrences, the first action to take is to place ice cold water, cold wet towels, or cold compresses over the face and eyes of the victim.  Leave the nose and mouth uncovered for breathing.  Water or compresses must be 58 degrees or cooler (which is the mean temperature of the waters of the world) to trigger this reaction.  Keep the compress cold.  For extra protection apply an iced compress to the back of the neck at the base of the head.  This is all that is necessary.  This one paragraph may save your life, or the life of someone close to you.

    This is the whole technique, and all that is necessary to immediately trigger this natural oxygen conserving reflex.  The whole technique that can save a life in a single paragraph?  Unbelievable?  Not if you speak with Jeff Dobkin.

Another example. 

    You live 20 minutes out in the country.  On a warm summer night you are sitting on the porch when your spouse, who has been feeling pale and weak all day, has a heart attack.  You call for an ambulance, twenty minutes away.  You don’t know CPR.  You now have two choices.  You can helplessly watch your spouse, who has just stopped breathing, lay there on the floor.  Or you can initiate the Dobkin Technique to trigger the diving reflex.  Which would you rather do?  “Let me be more specific about using the Dobkin Technique. If something isn’t done right now, this person will die.”   This is when the technique is used.

 …in a terrifying moment you see her on the bottom of the pool.  You immediately pull her out, but she is completely lifeless.

Another example

    Just after you rushed into your house to answer the phone and grab a soda, your child falls into your swimming pool.  Within a few seconds she slips under with hardly a ripple, and sinks to the bottom.  Within two minutes she lies motionless at the bottom of the pool, not breathing.  You go out to check on her - remember just two minutes have passed, and in a terrifying moment you see her on the bottom of the pool.  You immediately pull her out, but she is completely lifeless.  Your daughter has two more minutes before irreversible brain damage and brain death occurs.  What would you do? 

No Governmental Approval

    For the people looking for government approval, it isn’t approved.  The Dobkin Technique is unauthorized.  And Dobkin knows it will be unauthorized forever.

    “This technique will never be accepted by the government.  And no physician group will ever back it as valid, either.”  The only way it has even the remotest possibility of being approved is if Dobkin spends the $20 million or so it typically takes to run tests.  And filling out the stacks and stacks of paperwork from the government for their approval.  Even then, since it’s a natural occurrence and not patentable, no pharmaceutical company in the world will take a penny’s worth of interest in.  So Dobkin knows this technique will be unauthorized forever. 

    “This technique is too valuable to be put in that political arena and be bounced around forever.”  Dobkin feels the decision to initiate this oxygen conserving reflex is within reach of each person; each person should know this option exists, and be allowed to make the choice if and when to trigger this reflex - or not to trigger the reflex.

    For all the research he has done, Jeff Dobkin has had a few rewards, he admits.  “I have received one nice present: a signed copy of Linus Pauling’s book when I sent him a copy of the technique.  The book arrived with a two-page letter from Dr. Pauling, agreeing the technique will work, and has great merit,”  says Dobkin.  “Any day you get a letter from a double Nobel Prize winner, you’ve got to feel pretty good.”  He continues, “To save just one life would make it all worthwhile.”

    After hundreds of hours of research, he’s willing to risk his own fortune this theory will save lives.  “I know I’m going to get sued,” he conjectures.  “Someone is going to try this on a dead person, and they will continue to be dead.  It’ll wind up in court.  You can sue anyone for anything; all you need is a lawyer.  There are plenty of lawyers.” 

    “But,” he continues, “I’m ready to get sued.  I’ve held up the release of this lifesaving information since my original research ended in 1986, and I wrote this paper. ‘What to do until the ambulance comes’ only has meaning to people who have suffered through this time period of crisis while watching someone die. Think of all the lives that could have been saved since then.  How many children could have been saved?  If this procedure saves just one child from SIDS, it’s worth all the risk I take.  It’s worth all the money I have.  How about if it was your child?”

Another example

    Unknown to you, your 4 year-old child put a screwdriver into an electrical outlet, and has received a direct current shock.  After several minutes of silence, you come into the room to see what she’s up to.  You see her lying on the floor; she is not breathing.  No other information is available.  You don’t know CPR.  What do you do? 

    “The choice is very clear to me - the technique will save lives,” says Dobkin.  “You can make this choice for yourself.”  The question isn’t if Dobkin’s technique works.  There is a reflex, and it has worked for thousands of cold water drowning victims.  The question is, does Dobkin’s technique of initiating the mammalian diving reflex provide an added margin of safety to victims?  Is it a valid time-buying procedure? 

    This news article seeks to provide the knowledge that a technique such as this is available, and provides the information of how to trigger this reflex in time of emergency.  The purpose is to give readers their own choice. 

    For the technical paper supporting the use of this technique, please see other parts of this website.  If you know someone who was saved by this technique, please call Jeffrey Dobkin at 610-642-1000.  Thank you.