Intranasal delivery of compounds that reduce intrancranial pressure
Increasing intranasal lymphatic circulation as a means of decreasing intracranial pressure in traumatic brain injury.
1. A method of treating a patient having a raised intracranial pressure, comprising:
a) irradiating a nasal lymphatic tissue of the patient with an amount of red light of between about 0.02 J/cm 2 and 200 J/cm 2 to increase lymphatic circulation.
2. The method of claim 1 wherein the patient has hydrocephalus.
3. The method of claim 1 wherein the patient has a stroke.
4. The method of claim 1 wherein the patient has traumatic brain injury.
5. The method of claim 1 wherein the irradiation is accomplished by inserting a red light emitting probe into a nasal cavity and activating the red light probe to emit red light.
6. The method of claim 5 wherein the red light emitting probe is placed adjacent an olfactory mucosa.
7. The method of claim 5 wherein the red light emitting probe is placed adjacent lymphatics located in a submucosa of an olfactory epithelium.
8. The method of claim 5 wherein the red light emitting probe is placed adjacent lymphatics that encircle olfactory nerve trunks on an extracranial surface of a cribriform plate.
9. The method of claim 1 wherein a pain-killer is sprayed into a nasal cavity of the patient prior to irradiation.
10. The method of claim 1 wherein the amount of red light is between about 0.2 J/cm 2 and 50 J/cm 2 .
11. The method of claim 1 wherein the amount of red light is of between about 1 J/cm 2 and 10 J/cm 2 .