Stephanie Rudat, a personal friend of my family, is an energetic, attractive young lady who is building a successful career in real estate. While preparing a house to show a potential buyer, she struck a match to light a gas fireplace that had a slow leak. It exploded in her face.

She sustained first and second degree burns all over her face; her eyebrows and hairline were singed; and there were flash burns in her nasal passages and down into her windpipe. She was taken by ambulance to the hospital and admitted to the intensive care unit.

During her three-day hospital stay, she was evaluated by a plastic surgeon. She was told that she could expect to have scarring and patches of discoloration, which would likely require plastic surgery to correct.

My wife and I visited Stephanie in the hospital, and she told me about her prospects for plastic surgery. I told her that first—as soon as she was released from the hospital—she should come to the clinic for hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT). The day after she was released, she began a course of HBOT and over the next three weeks had 25 treatments.

Less than one month after her accident, Stephanie's face was completely healed—with no scarring at all. In fact, one of her doctors commented that if he didn't know she'd had a severe flash burn, he would never believe it had happened.

— from Health & Healing by Julian Whitaker, MD