Domenic Greco, 60, pioneer in brain study

DOMENIC GRECO refused to let a crippling neurological disease that was eating away at his body and wracking him with terrible pain stop him from working.

By the end, he was able to communicate only by blinking his eyes, the only movement that Lou Gehrig's disease had left him.

When he lost his eyesight, he knew it was time to call it quits. He died Thursday at age 60. He lived in Fort Washington.

The reason Domenic fought so hard was that he had work to do. His professional life had been devoted to helping people with such conditions as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children and adults, drug and alcohol addictions, stress, eating problems and other neurological conditions through the use of biofeedback and neurofeedback techniques.

In his final years, he was developing headgear for Smart Brain Games, a biofeedback system that helps people with ADHD, autism or Asperger's to regulate their attention spans by seeing their own brain activity through skullcaps equipped with sensors.

Domenic was a founder and associate of a number of therapeutic agencies on the West Coast and in the Philadelphia area for 30 years, lectured widely and worked as a consultant with NASA and Johnson & Johnson.

He became executive director in 1996 of NeuroDynamix, in Plymouth, Montgomery County, using neurofeedback, the system that allows patients to see and control their own brain activity, to treat ADHD and other conditions.

"Unfortunately, my brother suffered from unbearable pain during the last few months of his life," said his sister, Francine Greco. "He never complained, and was only interested in the welfare of everyone else."

Domenic was diagnosed in January 2009 with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, known as Lou Gehrig's disease because it caused the death of the famous New York Yankees player in 1941.

"Within a few months, he began to lose fine motor control of the fingers on his right hand," Francine said. "He then began to trip and fall and soon lost his ability to walk," his sister said.

The disease began to affect his breathing and swallowing, and he made the decision to use a ventilator so that he could continue to work.

Domenic and his son Devon developed Blinktracker, a device that types a patient's words on a computer screen by tracking eye movement.

"When his eyes began to fail him, he realized that he would no longer be able to contribute to his family or the community," his sister said. "He scheduled the date to stop his ventilator and told us he wanted everyone to start 'living life.' "

Domenic Greco was born in Philadelphia to Anthony and Frances Greco. He graduated from Cheltenham High School in 1970 and went on to St. Joseph's University, where he majored in psychology and graduated in 1978.

He received a Ph.D. in 1989 from the Professional School of Psychological Studies, in San Diego, majoring in clinical psychology. He was licensed in California as a marriage, family and child counselor, and became certified in biofeedback therapy in 1984.

He founded or co-founded a number of centers to treat neurological disorders and to train therapists in San Diego, while running his own practice.

"The brain is producing too much slow-wave activity," he said after moving back to Philadelphia in 1996. Through practice and feedback, he said, people with attention problems can learn to produce more of the fast waves associated with being calm, alert and focused.

The treatment was embraced by parents who balked at giving their children drugs to control behavior.

"We are not curing someone of ADHD," Domenic said. "We're teaching them self-regulation."

Among his patients was the late comedian Flip Wilson, who would drive Domenic to his home for private treatment.

"Domenic was a handsome, extremely bright, hardworking and innovative man who was always more concerned about the welfare of others rather than his own," his sister said.

Besides his sister, son and parents, Domenic is survived by his wife, Bambi Lynn; another son, Brandon; and two grandchildren.

Services: Were being arranged.