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Gee I wish you had not asked this question as I feel compelled to give you my personal experience with magnetic woolen underlay. I feel sorry for your mother as I am a 79 yr old man. The only benefit that I could see as a result of my experience was that the shop that sold the blanket got $ 150 of my money. I took the blanket off and tossed it away. The only people I have ever heard sing the praises of this equipment are those with a vested interest in selling it. Stick with your doctor and rely on him/her for pain treatment. In Australia we have clinics where you can learn to "manage" your pain, some things you avoid doing others you do to aid you etc. I am currently on Panadol osteo for arthritus and it works, but stay with doctor or if you can find a top chiropractor go to them. I have and been helped. Good luck to your mum.

13 years ago. Rating: 0
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Magnet therapyFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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This article is about static magnetic fields in alternative medicine. For medical uses of electromagnetism, see Electromagnetic therapy (disambiguation).
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Alternative medicine

Magnet therapy, magnetic therapy, or magnotherapy is an alternative medicine practice involving the use of static magnetic fields. Practitioners claim that subjecting certain parts of the body to magnetostatic fields produced by permanent magnets has beneficial health effects. Magnet therapy is considered pseudoscientific due to both physical and biological implausibility, as well as a lack of any established effect on health or healing.[1][2][3] Although hemoglobin, the blood protein that carries oxygen, is weakly diamagnetic and is repulsed by magnetic fields, the magnets used in magnetic therapy are many orders of magnitude too weak to have any measurable effect on blood flow.[4]

Contents [hide]
1 Methods of application
2 Purported mechanisms of action
3 Efficacy
3.1 Pain
3.1.1 Menstrual pain
4 Safety
5 Reception
5.1 Legal regulations
6 See also
7 References
8 External links

[edit] Methods of application
Magnetite ring.Magnet therapy is the application of the magnetic field of electromagnetic devices or permanent static magnets to the body for purported health benefits. Some practitioners assign different effects based on the orientation of the magnet; under the laws of physics, magnetic poles are symmetric.[5][6] Products include magnetic bracelets and jewelry; magnetic straps for wrists, ankles, knees, and the back; shoe insoles; mattresses; magnetic blankets (blankets with magnets woven into the material); magnetic creams; magnetic supplements;[7] and water that has been "magnetized". Application is usually performed by the patient.[8]

[edit] Purported mechanisms of actionPerhaps the most common suggested mechanism is that magnets might improve blood flow in underlying tissues. The field surrounding magnet therapy devices is far too weak and falls off with distance far too quickly to appreciably affect hemoglobin, other blood components, muscle tissue, bones, blood vessels, or organs.[1][9] A 1991 study on humans of static field strengths up to 1 T found no effect on local blood flow.[4][10] Tissue oxygenation is similarly unaffected.[9] Some practitioners claim that the magnets can restore the body's theorized "electromagnetic energy balance", but no such balance is medically recognized. Even in the magnetic fields used in magnetic resonance imaging, which are many times stronger, none of the claimed effects are observed.[11]

[edit] EfficacySeveral studies have been conducted in recent years to investigate what, if any, role static magnetic fields may play in health and healing. Unbiased studies of magnetic therapy are problematic, since magnetisation can be easily detected, for instance, by the attraction forces on ferrous (iron-containing) objects; because of this, effective blinding of studies (where neither patients nor assessors know who is receiving treatment versus placebo) is difficult.[12] Incomplete or insufficient blinding tends to exaggerate treatment effects, particularly where any such effects are small.[13] Health claims such as longevity and cancer treatment are implausible and unsupported by any research.[14][9] More mundane health claims, most commonly pain relief, also lack any credible proposed mechanism, and clinical research is not promising.[8][15][16]

[edit] PainEffects of magnet therapy on pain relief beyond non-specific placebo response have not been adequately demonstrated. A 2008 systematic review of magnet therapy for all indications found no evidence of an effect for pain relief, with the possible exception of osteoarthritis.[15] It reported that small sample sizes, inadequate randomization, and difficulty with allocation concealment all tend to bias studies positively and limit the strength of any conclusions. In 2009 the results of a randomized double-blind placebo-controlled crossover trial on the use of magnetic wrist straps (a leather strap with a magnetic insert) for osteoarthritis were published, addressing a gap in the earlier systematic review. This trial showed that magnetic wrist straps are ineffective in the management of pain, stiffness and physical function in osteoarthritis. The authors concluded that "[r]eported benefits are most likely attributable to non-specific placebo effects".[17][18]

13 years ago. Rating: 0
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