Eric Dacanay
April 13, 2004
NE 24

For over 3,000 years, magnetic therapy has been in practice in the belief it has therapeutic benefits for different ailments. The number of people who claim that magnetic therapy helps them in their ailments has been on the rise to this present day. Today, there are thousands of people that use this type of therapy, resulting in a $150 million industry. Supporters of magnetic therapy claim it does not “cure” the body, but rather sets the body up into a state to heal itself. Although there are many beliefs about the “healing powers” of magnetic therapy, there is very little evidence to prove that these claims are true. There are not enough scientific studies that have been conducted to evaluate these claims.

Magnets for healing purposes was first used by the Greeks and the Egyptians over 3,000 years ago. As time passed and word got around about the many positive claims people made about what this therapy could do, more and more Egyptians and Greeks started to use it. The Romans and Hindus also began to use it, as described in Hindu religious documents. There is evidence of ancient societies mining magnetite to use in potions.

So what does magnetic therapy actually do? There are those that believe that it acts “like a shiatsu massage”; some claim magnets affect the iron in red blood cells; still others claim that magnets create an alkaline reaction in the body” (see web site skeptic.com). Mainly, though, magnetic therapy uses pulsed electromagnetic fields, which in turn, induce electric fields. This is believed to work since the body is made up mostly of water, which is diamagnetic. Since it is diamagnetic, the electrons in the water molecules have altered motions when a magnet is applied to the body, therefore supposedly increasing circulation in the blood and stimulation of nerves, both of which relieve pain. Also, the human body is believed to contain small amounts of magnetic materials, specifically magnetite, but it seems unlikely that the body has enough of it to validate the claims of magnetic therapy. More likely (although unproven) mechanisms are those based on magnetic forces moving charged particles (molecular ions) in flowing blood, moving them across cell membranes, across synapses between nerve cells, etc... Although no physical mechanisms for magnetic therapy have been established, the possibilities are numerous and complex (see web site Encarta.msn.com).

The many supporters claim that magnetic therapy has many different types of healing powers. They believe it is effective for the following ailments: pain, inflammation, arthritis, Alzheimer’s disease, diabetes, aches, muscle tension, migraine headaches, allergies, asthma, fibromyalgia, temporomandibular joint (TMJ) disorder, and brain tumors. They also claim that it can heal broken bones faster, and is effective in treating depression. This lengthy list for the conditions for which magnetic therapy is useful for has convinced many to believe in its efficacy, even though not much evidence is given support its claims.

There are a few experiments that have been conducted to test the effects of magnetic therapy. The two main experiments gave conflicting results. The first was done in 1997 at Baylor College of Medicine by Dr. Carlos Vallbona. The subjects were fifty people that had pain as a result of having the polio virus as children. All of them were given magnetic strips, but only twenty-nine of them were real magnets. Twenty-one of them were given non-magnetic strips. For forty-five minutes, they were all to place the strips on their aching parts. The results were that “just over three-quarters of the patients with real magnets experienced pain relief, while just under one-fifth of those without magnets felt an improvement” (Seniorhealth.com). Naturally, this is the experiment that many advocates of magnetic therapy cite as to evidence of the effectiveness of magnetic therapy. But since there has only been one such test conducted, many more need to be done in order to validate or invalidate the results of this experiment at Baylor College.

The other well-known experiment regarding magnetic therapy was done at New York College of Podiatric Medicine. In this experiment, nineteen patients were given magnetic insoles to wear, while fifteen patients wore non-magnetic insoles over the course of four weeks. Sixty percent of both groups them experienced pain relief, implying that the magnetic insoles have no increased benefit or healing powers as opposed to just regular, non-magnetic, insoles.

The main reason why there has not been a serious investigation of this therapy is because of the $150 million per year industry that has been created for the use of magnetic therapy. It is endorsed by many athletes, including tennis player, Lindsey Davenport, former NFL star, Dan Marino, and golfers Jim Colbert and John Huston. Marketers of the product do not conduct any scientific testing and really do not care as long as sales of magnetic bands, insoles, and back braces continue to increase. There are enough people that believe in the efficacy of magnets to create and sustain a large market for the practice.

In conclusion, magnetic therapy has yet to answer many questions its doubters raise. The effectiveness of this type of therapy is unknown because of insufficient scientific evidence to support claims of its believers. Once more experiments are performed and facts are presented, this therapy will either become credible and even more widely used, or it will fade away like phrenology.

References

“Alternative Medicine Magnetic Therapy.” 29 March 2004.

“Electromagnetic Radiation,” Microsoft® Encarta® Online Encyclopedia 2004. 2 April 2004. © 1997-2004 Microsoft Corporation.

“Magnetic Therapy.” 27 June 2003.

“Magnet Therapy,” Microsoft® Encarta® Online Encyclopedia 2004. 2 April 2004. © 1997-2004 Microsoft Corporation.

“Magnet Therapy, Magnetic Healing.” 10 December 2003.

Barrett, Stephen. “Magnet Therapy.” Magnet Therapy. 25 September 2002.

Livingston, James. “Magnetic Therapy Plausible Attraction.” Magnetic Therapy: Plausible Attraction? July 1998.