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In this video I’m going to be talking about the Neuvana Xen Vagus Nerve Stimulator, the latest consumer device to claim to reduce your stress and improve your wellbeing. This device was released at the Consumer Electronic Show in January 2020, and I’ve been using it for the last two weeks, and I’d like to share my initial thoughts about it.

Artificial stimulation of the vagus nerve, or VNS for short, was originally developed in the West to help people with severe epilepsy. The first experiments date back to the 1930s, but it wasn’t until 1997 that technology was approved for clinical use, and that consisted of implants that directly connected to the vagus nerve to help the person’s nervous system stay calm so that the chance of having a fit was reduced.

It has since been used to help other conditions, such as chronic anxiety, bipolar disorder, alzheimers and even obesity. And until recently all of these treatments still required an implant.

Which is why I’m so excited about this product, the Neuvana Xen. This device uses auricular, or ear-based neurostimulation, which has proven to be an effective non-invasive method of vagus nerve stimulation. It’s not a medical device, it’s designed for those of us that could do with being more resilient to stress but don’t need surgical implants. To this end Neuvana claim that the device will help improve sleep, improve resilience to stress, reduce anxiety and improve mood. It retails at $400, which isn’t cheap, but then again we’re talking about some cutting edge technology here, so the price doesn’t surprise me, and if it achieves what it claims to achieve then it’s probably value for money for most people.

It’s a nice looking and simple device, much different from the prototype that I played with in 2015 that looked more like a military radio. The device itself pops in your pocket and you put in the earbuds and connect it to your phone via Bluetooth. And the great thing about it is that you can listen to music whilst you are using it, which makes it entirely practical for using on the train, or in the office. It’s not for using whilst driving or operating heavy machinery though, and I’ll explain why later.

So let’s get on what it’s like. Using the unit is a somewhat strange experience. You pop the headphones, select a programme in the app, and hit start. You can have it either run a standard routine, or to respond to your music and work to the beat of what you’re listening to.

Whilst I initially thought the music option was cool, after a few sessions I switched to the standard routines because I found it distracting.

The sound quality of the earbuds is fine. It’s not great but it’s ok. Lacks some bass so I wouldn’t use these as my normal listening method, but it’s not bad, reasonable sound range and sound isolation for earbuds.

But when you start up the programme you won’t really notice the sound quality because you get a tingling sensation in your left ear. The earbuds are after all using an electric charge and the vagus nerve runs down the left side of your neck, and when I’m using it I can actually feel tingling from my ear and down in to my neck. You can adjust the intensity so that it’s not uncomfortable but as I’m a raging Type A I tend to set the setting to maximum and just grin and bear the first few minutes until I get used to it, and then relax and listen to some music.

When you have it on music mode, it synchronises the tingling with the drum beat in the music. I tried it with some beatless ambient and I didn’t really notice the tingling. The sessions can be set anywhere from a few minutes up to 25 minutes maximum, the app tells you when the session has finished and of course you can carry on listening to music or take the headphones out.

The manufacturers recommend that you use it twice a day and claim that you will notice significant changes in your wellbeing after 30 days of use. Now I’ve been using it for a couple of weeks, twice a day and keeping note of how I feel before and after use, and I would say that there is a definite feeling of euphoria that I get after using the device. A kind of chilled and happy feeling that has really taken me by surprise given how simple it is to use. I’m definitely feeling relaxed afterwards, which is why I’d say don’t use it when you need to be super alert, such as when driving or operating machinery.

Another effect that I’ve noticed is how it calms my breathing. I’m asthmatic and whilst it doesn’t cause me a big problem because I manage my asthma using buteyko and Heartmath, I have noticed that my breathing is noticeably calmer afterwards, actually on par with a full buteyko session or 15 minutes of Heartmath, all whilst I listen to music or watch some Netflix, and this makes it very interesting.

#vagusnerve #vns #stress

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