Sigrún Þóra Sveinsdóttir discusses her work with HRV Biofeedback with Police in Iceland

July 11, 2024 00:46:28
Sigrún Þóra Sveinsdóttir discusses her work with HRV Biofeedback with Police in Iceland
Heart Rate Variability Podcast
Sigrún Þóra Sveinsdóttir discusses her work with HRV Biofeedback with Police in Iceland

Jul 11 2024 | 00:46:28

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Show Notes

In this episode, Sigrún Þóra Sveinsdóttir joins Matt to discuss her research on integrating Heart Rate Variability Biofeedback with Police in Iceland.

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Episode Transcript

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Welcome to the Heart Rate Variability podcast. Each week we talk about heart rate variability and how it can be used to improve your overall health and wellness. Please consider the information in this podcast for your informational use and not medical advice. Please see your medical provider to apply any of the strategies outlined in this episode. Heart Rate Variability Podcast is a production of Optimal LLC and optimal HRV. Check us [email protected] dot. Please enjoy the show. Welcome, friends, to the Heart Rate variability podcast. I am Matt. I'm with a very special guest today coming from Iceland, and she has promised that she's already given me some coaching to not totally butcher her name. So I met Sigrun. I'm close there. You can keep correcting me at the AAPB conference this year when she gave a wonderful workshop on her work with police in Iceland and how she was utilizing biofeedback to really help the police officers there. So as soon as I started listening to her talk, it's like I got to get her on the show. So I'm so thrilled to have you. So I don't we were joking about your last name. I couldn't even get close. But thank you for your patience with me and my pronunciation struggles. But please introduce yourself to our audience. [00:01:32] Speaker B: Absolutely. And thank you for inviting me to your podcast. I'm extremely honored and love to talk about HRV biofeedback and especially with the police. [00:01:42] Speaker A: Yes. [00:01:44] Speaker B: So yeah, my name is Serum Thorazputer and I come from Iceland with the hard r's. So please forgive me if I pronounce English with the hard R's. [00:01:58] Speaker A: So that's going to be a challenge on this podcast. I've heard you talk in your second language for a whole workshop and you were spectacular. So wonderful. [00:02:10] Speaker B: That's good. How I experienced HIV biofeedback was when I was a psychologist for the icelandic police, and I was extremely interested in how to engage people in taking control of their own psychology and physiology as well. So you can imagine how I was when I got to know HRV biofeedback. It hits exactly into these two categories. So yeah, it was amazing. And I was so lucky to work with Judith Anderson when I was working with the Icelandic police and she and her team from Canada named iPREP at the time, they came with their whole team, and we had a really big research and training with the Icelandic officers. So we rented a whole house. It was like an old hospital that hadn't been used for. It was empty, and we had all these floors just for trainings and it was like, how do you say? It was an acted circumstances, acted scenarios. [00:03:32] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:03:34] Speaker B: Where it was exactly like. Yeah. Like the duty for the police. And it was amazing. We just trained them in using the exercises, the breathing exercises, both in within the stressful scenarios. So. And we saw their physiology, how they changed when they were using these methods. And we had their iPads. [00:04:01] Speaker A: Yes. [00:04:02] Speaker B: Visualizing the heart rate and heart rate variability. And I was amazed seeing this. [00:04:10] Speaker A: So how did you. I'm curious, you know, one of the things, and, you know, I'm sure icelandic police and, you know, the police here that I've worked with in the United States, there's probably similarities and differences, but I would assume that probably not all the officers you started working with had even heard of heart rate variability, much less HRV biofeedback. So I'm curious how you got buy in from folks around, what the heck are we doing here? What are we majoring? Why are we doing this? So I'd love to hear a little bit about how you were able to engage the officers around HRV biofeedback. [00:04:52] Speaker B: So, good question. There were, like, many things that we had to think about and when we were designing our programs, and the first thing is how we package it. What are you doing? Are you improving your mental health? That's way too soft for them. [00:05:09] Speaker A: Okay, so there is some similarities between the two countries. [00:05:14] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So you could never say that you would get, you would not get high participation rates. So you have to name it, like, mental resiliency, which it is, of course, but the package, the name, all these things. You have to. Yeah, like you said, you have to. Or sell it in a way, which is, it is not a lie. It's a mental resilience program. [00:05:40] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:05:40] Speaker B: And also what, what they love, what the police loves about HIV biofeedback, is that it's so tangible and you see numbers that you can actively try to increase, and it's like, it's so motivating. When they saw the numbers, they were like, yes, I'm better now. So they were really, really motivated with that. And of course, the research, when we had, we started our training with a 1 hour workshop, and it was designed in a way that. And what I love to do is inform people, what are you doing? What are you doing to your brain? What are you doing to your body? And all these things to have it, like, open, it's not. So they know all these things. It's not like a magic something that I should just know as the clinician. I think it's really important that people know exactly what they're doing because they're interested. They want to know exactly what they're doing. [00:06:47] Speaker A: Yep. And I think that's one of the things I love about HRV biofeedback, is that there's a, you know, sometimes, like mindfulness or meditation, even though there's research to back it up, it doesn't really. You don't get a lot of data per yourself, you know, so, yeah, there's the science and. Okay, I guess, but, yeah. What's that mean for me? I always call it like the. From a research perspective, the n of one, because they get feedback on themselves as that individuals, obviously, you get a lot more data, but they get to see that impact on themselves, which I just find is an incredible motivator for people to engage them around this. [00:07:31] Speaker B: Definitely. I couldn't agree more. [00:07:33] Speaker A: Yeah. Awesome. So I'd love to just kind of, like, geek out with you a little bit about how you set up this research. You know, putting them in training simulations, heart rate variability, biofeedback. This is what I loved about your workshop, about how you designed the program and studying it. So I'd love you to share how you structured this before we dive into some of the cool outcomes that you got. [00:08:06] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. I love to talk about it because we thought a lot about it. I thought, I have to design it so it will work, because first, and the most important reason behind it is I really wanted it to influence the police officers. And we did a little pilot study or two, actually, two pilot studies, and we saw that it was a challenge to get participation. We saw. Not the. I'm not the only one. [00:08:40] Speaker A: Yeah. You're a good company here. You're a good company. Yes. [00:08:44] Speaker B: So that was so we know. Okay. We've got a little touch on that. [00:08:49] Speaker A: So. [00:08:49] Speaker B: Okay. That's gonna be our number one challenge to get people to do the exercises, because, I don't know, it's also just in our culture, icelandic culture, maybe. It's also in other cultures. People are so busy. They have so many things. Wow. They are what? They got 100% jobs, 100% studying or something like that. On top of it, you know? [00:09:13] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:09:14] Speaker B: And then they have family, of course. So all these things are, you know, taking their attention, which is good. But we have to somehow put this in all of these things, which is a big challenge. So, yes, that was one of the most important parts. And I tried to find, like, all these kind of different kind of ways to motivate them and just to understand that it is a challenge, and it would be also for me to do something like this, something new. So we have to think like them in that way. And so we designed, like, we had weekly calls. So our research team was trained in doing these weekly calls, which is both to help them do the resonance frequency breathing, do it correctly. Because we only had three individual sessions, we were using the protocol from Lede, but it's used five, but we did only three. So we knew we had to have at least these weekly phone calls also to. Yeah, to work on that. But the phone calls were also, how are you doing? Why did you do the exercises? And they also recorded it in a daily diary, like online diary, which, of course, these apps, amazingly, all have figured out. So they recorded how many minutes and how many times and also how they felt after each time. And that was actually a really important part. Firstly, I thought it was maybe more for the research, but they were actually really interested in seeing. Wow, okay. I feel much better and my fatigue levels are reduced. So I think that's really important for themselves to have that feedback as well. [00:11:23] Speaker A: That's so cool. So what was some of the feedback you were getting? Because, again, from your workshop, it's not like sometimes I think, you know, we think about isolated things come to mind, maybe here in the US, but really, you know, police being police, I think everywhere are under really, really stressful situations. There's a high level of uncertainty. You never know what's going to happen. It could be an easy shift or it could be a traumatic shift. Every, every day you go to work has a potential, unlike a lot of jobs, just to be, you know, life threatening, even just putting the uniform on. And so as they started, as you start, they started to breathe. I just kind of wondered what were some of the reactions in those calls that you got assuming a lot of the officers, maybe the first time they actually focused on their breathing in any kind of meaningful way. [00:12:25] Speaker B: Good point. That's a good point. Because they started to think about their breath more. Absolutely. That was one of the things I heard. But from overall, I heard that people felt that the officers felt less fatigued after doing the breathing exercises. They had more tension and they felt better. They were more relaxed. So I was really, really happy. And that's one of the things why I love biofeedback, just hearing that it's working also, just momentarily, not just so it works. You can feel it straight away. Of course. It's one of the things that you can feel yourself. [00:13:06] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:13:07] Speaker B: But I was so happy to hear that they were feeling it themselves, but, yeah. So. And also one specific feedback that I got that I thought I love to hear, especially being with the family myself, is that they. One person, they spoke about having longer threats, you know, their emotional react. They were less emotionally reactive towards their family and their children. That I thought was extremely nice to hear. [00:13:40] Speaker A: That is awesome. So did you, were you able to measure anything like, you know, on the job? You know, I know you did some performance stuff as well, so I'd love for you to kind of dive into that as well. And again, feel free to kind of get really specific about the research design that you did because I know our audience would be really interested in that as well. [00:14:03] Speaker B: Absolutely. Let me just go through that. And that's actually a study that's. So. We measured a whole lot of things, so I'm so grateful for them. They were so patient in doing all of these measures because we measured that all of them went through. It was randomized control into intervention and a waitlist group, and they went through cognitive batteries to combined cognitive tests while being measured, their physiology was measured. Measured. That's another study that I am finishing right now. We're seeing how the intervention influenced their physiology while they were under cognitive stress. They also went. We took their baselines and we took a short PBT test, psychomotor vigilance tests. We did all these measures. They went through a workshop, 1 hour workshop in HRV biofeedback to motivate their understanding and their willingness to engage as well. And then they had an individual training where we found their resonance breathing frequency according to Ledev five wizard protocol. And then the training started. And when the training started, they always got a text. I texted them, like, nuggets about research, nuggets about HRV biofeedback, how it can help you. And they were all, because it's so amazing how it works on so many levels. And it was funny when I texted the message about how it lowers your cravings, I got an answer for one like, wow, really? That's so interesting. So that's awesome. That was really fun, actually. So I had these daily texts because I know you have to be like, it's a reminder. You have to have all, every day without being too, too much. So we had that when the training started, and they should do the exercises 20 minutes, twice a day. Of course, we knew that they wouldn't do all of it, but still, we were doing it according to the protocol. And they had their daily diary where they're recording their activity, and we had weekly phone calls which where they were scheduled and like, hey, checking in. How are you doing? And if there was something not working, we always help them. How can we help you? What could help do the exercises? Could you do them differently or something? And two and a half week into the program, it was a five week HRV biofeedback training. We met them also. There was an individual session where we helped them and also measured their baseline levels and the Pvt performance. And always the physiology. We always measured the physiology while doing the cognitive tests. So that kept on the same program until the end of five week. And then we had exactly the same physiology measures. Cognitive tests. Yeah. And all these measures, we had them in the end as well. [00:17:36] Speaker A: Awesome. So I'm excited to share the results that you're seeing with the study. So why don't we dive into that a little bit, which I can't wait to share with our audience. [00:17:50] Speaker B: Yeah, it was amazing. We were so grateful because this was actually a very small sample. We had about almost not under 30 randomly switched to two divided to two groups. So we didn't have many participants. So we were okay. Hopefully we got something out of it. So we were really happy in seeing. We had a statistically significant difference between the waitlist group and the intervention group in HRV as measured by RMSSD. So they were statistically higher RMSD than the intervention group by 20. And then their increase was 22 units. It was quite high compared. So we were like, yes, okay, we did it. We increased their HRe, which was the purpose of the training, and that was really good. But also the subjective measures that were measuring their mental resiliency because we wanted to improve their mental resinity, they also were significant. So. [00:18:59] Speaker A: Wow. Just a question about their HRV. The RMSSD, was that just measured as you were doing, like, the cognitive assessments? Was that just measured sort of a couple times throughout the study? I'd be curious how you assess their RMSSD. [00:19:19] Speaker B: Yeah, we assess them. So we assess them as baseline, five minute baseline, in the beginning, in the middle, and at the end. And it was just, if you see like a line graph, the dots went, like, higher and higher. It eats for the intervention, but the control group just stayed exactly the same. So that was so. It was like a textbook. It was exactly what we wanted to see. [00:19:47] Speaker A: That makes sense. That's just for our audience, who may not nerd out about RMSsD like we do, that's a huge. A huge jump in their resting heart rate variability. That's an amazing result. [00:20:03] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely it is. And so for the cognitive measures. It's actually another study that I'm just finishing now and about to sending off, so that will be for another presentation because that's also exciting to share. But about the mental resiliency measures that we did, we measured their fatigue, both cognitive and physical fatigue, and it was statistically significant difference both between the groups and the increase before and after for the intervention group. So that was really nice to see. Their fatigue levels decreased significantly for the intervention group and also their mindfulness awareness. We measured that that increased significantly for the intervention group. And also there was a significant difference between both groups at the end. [00:21:02] Speaker A: Awesome. [00:21:03] Speaker B: That was amazing. And finally, the attentional control scale. We use that to see the attentional control. And that also was significantly different between the groups at the end. And also the increase was significant. So that was good to see at the end. [00:21:23] Speaker A: That is amazing. I guess probably if we would have thought about, okay, what would we love to see in this study? We could dream about these sort of results. I think we both have enough history and heart rate variability where we would assume, yeah, we would get it, but it's just so great, again, working with this population because the stress of their jobs did not go away during this study. I'm assuming you didn't send them some tropical island for the study. They're still going to work each and every day. They got their family, they got their busy lives, and yet seeing these great results coming out of this, this really, really exciting stuff. [00:22:06] Speaker B: It is, it is. I absolutely agree. And I'm so excited to keep studying on this and working on this because it's amazing to be using something and studying something that truly works and on so many levels. [00:22:21] Speaker A: Yeah. So I'm curious with your work, you know, with the police services or whatever term we use over at Iceland, you got these amazing results. You've got a profession who's, again, what I know, and I'm assuming there's high burnout, dangerous situations. If they make a wrong decision, their life or somebody else's life might be in danger. You've got this really great results. I wonder what's the reaction to this that you're getting when you talk to leadership now in the police force, because it seems like you found a pot of gold that could really address some of the issues we know face police officers and other first responders that are in those high stress positions. [00:23:22] Speaker B: Yeah, it's a great question. So I'm actually in a really good collaboration with the head of the police training center in Iceland, and he's incredible. His name is Oli and he got me familiar with this, so he loves it and he's really interested in doing more collaboration. So they're really. So I would say the police are really positive in continuing this, and hopefully it will be a dream come true. They will just be a part of the trader training. They're in the university and. Yeah. So that would be a dream come true. Absolutely. [00:24:02] Speaker A: And I think that that is the model in any of these. Like, oh, in the US, the other burned out professions like social work, mental health, healthcare, I mean, police officers are in that mix as well as other first responders. I love exactly what you said. It's like, we need to ensure that we release these new professionals out in the wild to their jobs with already built in skills. And if we can build their resiliency through things like HRV biofeedback before they enter an incredibly stressful occupation, hopefully we give them resiliency tools that can really help improve performance, improve longevity, improve mental health. Like, we're just setting people up with a whole different set of tools to enter these professions. And that's what I love about how you think about this, is that's where I think we get the real great benefits long term with things like HRV biofeedback. [00:25:12] Speaker B: I couldn't agree more, Matt. I couldn't agree more. And I absolutely, just repeating what you said, I experienced this on firsthand when I was working as a police psychologist, seeing all these police officers going into burnout or having mental health issues, which is, I think it's just inevitable working so and so many years in these high stress environments. So I think it's just a matter of time if you're working in these environments when you experience some kind of. Yeah, some kind of negative effect. So I think it's. Yeah, it should be a requirement that they would have some kind of training in reducing that beforehand. [00:26:01] Speaker A: So I would love to ask you maybe an impossible question. And I just throw that out there because it's something that I have struggled with, folks, that I've talked about integrating HRV, HRV biofeedback. And I don't think this was inherent to your study specifically, but it brings up, I think, a fascinating ethical point. When we talk about folks like law enforcement, I throw maybe surgeons, airline pilots, where there's real consequences to mistakes. And that is where, and again, I know we're stepping a little bit outside your research. So I always like to give my guests the ability to speculate without anybody saying, well, you said this three years ago on the podcast, so we're entering a little bit of the speculative zone here, but one of the things, like, when we looked at integrating, like, our optimal HRV app with folks, which has the biofeedback piece of it, but also has daily RMSD tracking. And one of the real struggles that police leadership had is, okay, I have an officer who wakes up and their RMSSD is 50% below their baseline. So, just a five minute reading, we see this crash. What do we do with that? And that is one of the challenges, um, that I see with is because do I want. Do I want my pilot to fly me across the country if their. Their autonomic nervous system's a mess today? No, but do I want my plane to take off on time? And the answer is yes. So, if all the pilots didn't show up that were in red or. Or having poor RMSSD scores, we may not get anybody anywhere, and the whole industry might crash. I imagine if you did a lot of just RMSSD assessments around the United States with our police force, we would see a lot of people burned out right now, which you and I both know, and so is our audience, that if your RMSA. If your heart rate variability is crashing, your decision, your cognitive ability, your emotional regulation, your decision making, all the things that potentially, as we talk about, could be life and death are hindered with that. And I just. Again, we're entering the zone of speculation, because I know this was beyond your initial search, but what do you think is people have watches on. People have rings on whoop straps, all these different things. How do you think police should think about an officer who's in the red or struggling? When we look at low officers, RMSSD or SDNN or other scores that really are a good indication of not managing stress well, yeah, I think you hit. [00:29:02] Speaker B: A really good point. And it's been often. It has come up often since I've entered into these physiological and measures and even subjective measure fields where you. Where you're improving the self regulation part, but with. It's so important with all of these measures and with all these consciousness of the physiology and also the mental, we have to respect that. It comes with the responsibility. So I think we have to be equipped or equip the officers with methods if we're going to have all these measures and help them follow and regulate their physiology or their subjective mental state. I think it's really important that we have also the measures to influence both of these measures, both physiological and subjective. But I think we have to be really careful in respecting the privacy of all these data. So I think that's the point. I think we can, at least at this point in time, I think it should always be private, the measures, but at the same time I think it would be really important that we equip those people who get their RMSSD in their whatever they have, that we also equip them with measures, with means to regulate these measures. So I think that would be. Yeah, and with the police officers at least from my experience, they're extremely, which I totally respect and understand private with these, you know, as you probably know, like with these measures, mental health or physiological, which is extremely understandable. That was my experience at least. [00:31:04] Speaker A: Yeah. And I would totally. And it's just this kind of holding both sides of this that I think is like we're hitting a very interesting ethical issue. I wouldn't even call it a dilemma necessarily because we're trying to move to a positive is how, how do we, how do we send a healthy police force out into our community? Knowing historically we, you look at research, at least here in the states, that they are usually in the top ten and most burned out professions. So historically we have not done a great job. And I'm not blaming police leadership, it's just, it's an industry wide issue of keeping our police force mentally healthy. And at the same time now we have metrics to say are you doing okay today? And to get the answer is maybe not, which I still think is a huge amount of insight because sometimes my RMSSD isn't great in the morning either. Doesn't mean I can't show up to work, but it gives me a way to think about my day and myself and my capacity a little bit differently. So these metrics can be so important, they could be so useful for leadership. But at the same time, you know, are you going to, you know, if you're having, didn't get a good night's sleep, are you going to have like your twelve year old child take your morning RMSSD score just so you can go to work today and not have to hear your supervisor bug you about your, your HRV? So it's just this, we're at this, I think, really interesting moment in this biometric that now we can get it on, you know, people and get data each and every day and get, and use that data. Where do those, what do we do in these select fields where life and death decisions potentially are being made, if not on a daily basis, quite frequently with it. It's a fascinating topic to walk in. [00:33:19] Speaker B: I agree. I agree, definitely. And I think we should dive better into it because that's going to be the future. But there's one thing that coworker or companies and organizations such as the police and more can do is to give their coworkers space to utilize these exercises, give them space at work, these kind of things. So enhancing, but yeah, it's a big and controversial discussion, but important. Absolutely. Yeah. [00:33:53] Speaker A: And I really hope that we help industries take a look at current practices. Like, okay, so we're not, we don't have a healthy workforce. You know, what can we do? What works? Maybe it's a longer lunch break. Maybe it's a shorter workday. I know, you know, I don't know if this will ever hit the United States, but that whole idea in Europe of a four day workweek, you know, like some of these things. The good thing is you and I can help quantify the impact of these strategies. Like, like you did with HRV biofeedback of, you know. But what does. How many officers have even heard that this exist around the world? I would assume probably less than. Well, less than 1% have even heard about this. So it's like this interesting time where it's like, yeah, HRV biofeedback, we can, in the same infrastructure, the same science, not only track, but help improve. Again, I think, again, it's. What else is contributing to these high levels of burnout that we can maybe address in very scientific ways to, again, help our workforce, our critical workforce, stay really healthy throughout their careers. [00:35:17] Speaker B: Absolutely. And there's one memory that comes up when you were sharing this. When I was working first with biofeedback, there was one police officer who had a high stress arousal. He was in a high stress arousal and he saw a man with a prick and he saw it as a gun. [00:35:40] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:35:41] Speaker B: In the arousal. So it was. So it was just a tangible example on how it affects the perception and also how they work. [00:35:52] Speaker A: Yes. [00:35:53] Speaker B: So that's. So it's amazing how we can influence. This is important. [00:35:58] Speaker A: Yeah, that's, that was like, seeing through your workshop is like, oh, this is like, we need this research, your research, to get out there, to say, you know, that there are simple, affordable tools offer. And then, like, what I love you did is like, how do we package this in the states? It seems like first responders and military, they love the word tactical. So I'm employer, like, just call it tactical. Like, you know, and I joke with some of my police officer friends that I have is like, what if we call it tactical? And they're like, oh, then it would be fine. Like, it's. But it's, that's on us as, you know, researchers and, you know, providers of these resources to, like, how do we walk into their world with language, with, with messages, which it sounds like you did so incredibly well to really engage them in this in a way that maybe they've not been engaged in the past. You know, I think, oh, do this, you know, but really sitting with them and getting that language right, I think so important. [00:37:08] Speaker B: Absolutely. And thank you. At least I'm really happy about this result. And also there was one thing, because afterwards I was really thinking, you know, what else was there? Other things that might have helped because, and I felt there was one big thing. It's less tangible, but really important. It's the intention that you take with you into the research, the training, the person who's doing it. I think that matters a lot because it permeates everything and it influences everyone. So I think the intention, it's so important that the intention is to improve their health of the participants who are participating either in the training or the research. I think it's a really big part because I also got a question which was really good. And of course, when you get a good question, you always get the answer, like two days after. So I got a really good question. It was like, hey, but you're like a trained psychologist and you're like, really good at activating everyone and. But can, you know, what was it that engaged them? Would another person, if it did do exactly the same, would it influence as much? And I thought really much about this question, and I think the answer is this. The intention, it's so important. And if you can replicate this state of mind and intention to your research, who are helping you? Research assistants. [00:38:55] Speaker A: Yes. [00:38:55] Speaker B: You know, get them also into the state, like, hey, guys, we really want to help them, you know, if that is really important. And I thought we did that with our team because we met them weekly. [00:39:08] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:39:08] Speaker B: And always spoke to them like, hey, guys, now we're going to really improve. [00:39:13] Speaker A: I love that. I love that. You know, I assume, too, there's probably the support you gave the officers as well. I know that that's hard to parse out sometimes because you're kind of measuring the impact of the overall program, you know, as much as just the heart rate variability, biofeedback, obviously, you can isolate that. But, you know, it kind of makes sometimes our work tricky is they get focus on themselves. They get, you know, and I know you probably weren't doing, like, mental health interventions with them outside HRV biofeedback. But just to be with you all and be part of a program, there's all that. That piece, which I think is an important, like, part of any sort of program, is that social support and recognizing that you're doing really hard work here and that we. We want to help you stay healthy within this work, because I don't think a lot of officers over here necessarily ever get that message. You're supposed to show up, be all, you know, machismo and, like, tough, and you don't, you know, that mentality, I think, slams the door on that. So finding ways to open that. And again, with HRV biofeedback, I think you've really hit on something that, if presented in the right way, can be really, you know, an easy sort of piece for them to see. Okay, I'm getting data. [00:40:37] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:40:37] Speaker A: I'm not practicing loving kindness meditation, which I think really everybody should, but at the same time that. That without the data or the biofeedback aspect to it is, I think, going to be laughed at in a lot of these arenas, even though it shouldn't be. But it, you know, that's the genius of your approach, too. [00:41:01] Speaker B: Thank you. Thank you so much. [00:41:04] Speaker A: So I would love to, obviously, and it was great to have you here in Colorado as part of the AAPB. I just called my AAPB family. Even though I've only been to three conferences. I feel like it's a home for me. So I would sit there at the workshop. It's like. And I love to ask my guests this question. Where do you see if you look into your future, which I'm assuming includes heart rate variability, moving forward with all the great work you've done, where do you see this going 510 years from now? As technology gets better, more people hear about HRV, thanks to great researchers like yourself. What are sort of your hopes and aspirations looking into the future? [00:41:57] Speaker B: Great question, and thank you for asking me, because it's fun answering this question. And the conference, the AAP, it was incredible. I felt it, too. It's like a whole family. But, yeah, the future. So what I'm extremely interested in and is scaling it up. Scaling it up and making it more available and accessible to the person just autonomously so you can. So people can access it all by themselves, so they can do it. Because you said 510 years. I think it's extremely rational to think that they can do it without any clinician. That would be. I think that's at least my dream to scale it up in that way because I always love to bring people the tools and all the necessary so they can themselves be equipped to do it themselves, take the responsibility themselves. [00:43:00] Speaker A: I love it. And what I love about you, your work, your passion is like, if you can do this in Iceland, it gives the rest, you know, and I'm here in the States, it gives us a model to say this is how it can be successful, and here is the data to back it up. And if you think just because these police are over in Iceland and you're in Detroit or LA, that it's totally different worlds, it's not right. We're talking about high stress jobs with historically high levels of burnout. And so that's where in some ways, I love that you're at Iceland because you seem to have a grasp and an integration into the system in a great way to potentially give the rest of us a really exciting model to advocate for the health of police officers all over the world. [00:44:03] Speaker B: Absolutely. Thank you. I think it's exciting also. And that's another conversation. It's like to use HRV biofeedback also for other kinds of methods, just like you said, loving kindness and stuff like that. Where you. Because I think when you use these methods, combines with this biofeedback, it makes it so much more tangible. So that's another big discussion. So I think the future will also be there. [00:44:33] Speaker A: And well, I am excited to. I'll hopefully have you back as that future starts to manifest. Because like said, I was just so, so excited. You can tell. I don't know if you got this about AAPB, but it's a pretty intense, I mean, you've got like the fathers, godfathers of HRV biofeedback sitting in your workshop asking you questions. And I could just see, you know, some of these folks that I've created. I feel safe calling them friends at this point. It's like, oh, yeah, she's got it. Certain people say it's nod and get excited. I'm like, yep, she's where she needs to be. And yeah, just, it's so great to have gotten your research. Like I said, I hope you come back as you continue to evolve and I can help you hopefully spread that message as far and wide as possible. [00:45:37] Speaker B: Absolutely. And I would love to. That sounds great. And I'm looking forward to the next meeting in San Diego. [00:45:45] Speaker A: Absolutely. Me too. Me too. When I saw San Diego, I just put a huge smile on my face. So it's one of my favorite cities. Excited to go there as well. So we'll put some information about your background, the research, everything in show notes, which, as always, folks can [email protected]. dot but again, I want to thank you so much for your time, your energy. I was just, after your workshop, I was like, oh, I got to get her on as a guest. So I appreciate and I hope this is the first of many, many conversations. [00:46:18] Speaker B: Absolutely. Thank you so much, Matt. It's been lovely to speak about this exciting material. [00:46:24] Speaker A: Awesome. Well, everybody, have a great weekend. We'll see you again next week.

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