Thoughts on Permanent Magnets and Medicine

Probably the question I get asked the most about magnets is related to their medical success. Of course, the FTC/FDA prohibits making claims about magnets in medicine until they are "proven". Herein lies the problem. All companies making medical devices have stockholders who are interested in a return on their investment. Since permanent magnets have been used in a variety of medical practices dating even back to the Egyptians, there really is nothing they can patent. Even 500 years ago, books were written on how to use magnets for medical benefit. Who knows how accurate they were is anyone's guess.

Back to business in the US; even if I was the president of a medical device manufacturing company, I would not spend our R&D funds on magnet therapy (but if my back was hurting ...). The FDA only recognizes medical data that meets certain criteria, hopefully to the highest scientific standards. Very little good data exists because the organizations who have the equipment and access to medical personnel have no interest in pursuing it. However, the medical device manufacturers know that they CAN patent any electromagnetic device for medical benefits. They can patent the number of turns of wire, the shape of the coil, the power supply, they can design some frequency or almost anything else about it. Once it is patented, they can charge whatever they want to for it and insurance companies will pay for it. As an example, a friend of mine had foot surgery within the past 2 years and was prescribed an electromagnetic device to wear on his foot 12 hours/day for 3 months to accelerate the bone growth. Well, my gauss meter shows between 5 and 10 gauss across the surface of this device and it had a little NiCad battery pack and charger attached. The cost: over $3,500! WOW! With 20% co-pay, it set him back $700.

Many have wondered if magnetic fields work on the human body, well an MRI would not work if they did not. Now we have to look at the different types of permanent magnets and their strength. The "el-cheapo" ferrite magnets have been around for many years and are by far the most common. The Neodymium Iron Boron have been around about 20 years and have only been reasonably priced for the past 5 years. Each have different uses and strengths. The Neos oxidize in contact with oxygen, which is why they are almost always plated with nickel or gold. The ferrites are rarely plated but do not oxidize and leave the residue on your hands. Both are very brittle and will break or chip if you let them slam together very much. The Neos have considerably higher strength for their size. Most people who have no experience with them are quite startled to find out that magnets that are 2 inches square by 1 inch thick can break bones if they are allowed to separate. I don't think it is possible to separate them by hand without using a wooden table to shear them apart. The Neos are quite reasonably price today, especially when you consider their power.

Now we come to people and considerations to keep in mind when using these. Everyone is different sizes and shapes. Any problem we might have has a different shape. The strength of a magnet drops off dramatically as you move away from the surface. For example, a neo magnet 1 inch square by 1/12 inch (2mm) thick will have an average surface gauss reading of 1,100 gauss. When you move 1 inch away from the surface the reading drops to just under 50 gauss. This magnet would cost you approximately $2.50. If you take a 4 inch by 5 inch by 1/2 inch neo plate of N38 material, the surface gauss reading would average 2,600 gauss. At a distance of 1 inch from the surface the reading would be over 400 gauss. This magnet would cost about $135.00. At a distance of 2.5 inches it would still be reading over 160 gauss.

Since people are a variety of shapes and sizes, is it reasonable to think that the same magnet would have the same effect on a 5 foot tall petite lady weighing 100 pounds as it would for a 300 pound man over 6 feet tall? Well, obviously not. Also, it would probably depend on the location of the problem. If both had a problem related to their skin, one might postulate that the same magnet would produce similar results. But, for example, a lower back pain, would be entirely different. If a magnet were thought to provide benefit on a tumor, it would stand to reason that if it was 1 inch in diameter and 1 inch deep in the body, would require an extremely large magnet to produce a significant magnetic field strength across the entire area.

Now we get to the real question, "Do magnets really have any effect?" Well, I do not want to lead anyone astray so I will list the PubMed - Medline research articles I found while searching their database.

Alteration of human tumor cell adhesion by high-strength static magnetic fields. PMID: 1399440 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Exposure to strong static magnetic field slows the growth of human cancer cells in vitro. MID: 8915544 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

An evaluation of the biological effects of three different modes of magnetic fields on cultured mammalian cells. PMID: 8725500 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

The brief information provided gives an indication that something is definitely happening. There are many more articles in this database and it is free to use for this basic information. You will find many tests where doctors report on trying basic magnets, but appear to have made no attempt to size the magnet for the application.

A study was recently published by Dr. Candace Brown that I found at http://www.natural-period-pain-relief.com/uk_research.htm that is very interesting.

I am interested in working with anyone in the medical field who is interested in conducting a valid study on this subject. Many of the studies I have read seem to simply use "off the shelf" magnets and apply them teh same to all test subjects. However, the real problem is that the strength of magnets varies so dramatically over distance, that a person's body size and problem location can significantly alter the results from person to person.

We first need a serious study with varying sizes of affected areas, varying lengths of exposure and varying duration of the experiment.

What is it that might be making the magnets work, if indeed they are proven to work scientifically? Well, some say iron in the blood, etc. I do not necessarily agree with that theory. I did my own tests with car engine oil and iron in the oil. I have oil analysis services that include particle count reporting and I used it on an oil sample in my car and split the one sample into two and let one be in the presence of a 2 inch square by 1 inch thick N35 magnet overnight. Then I let the magnet remove any particles it had attracted and then I sent both samples off and got the results back. For particle sizes down to 15 microns, the magnet totally removed all ferrous particles. However smaller than 15 microns seemed to be unaffected by the magnets. Both samples showed the same ppm count. On the other hand, my theory is that the body communicates with itself through electro-chemical signals, the magnetic fields may alter the way this communication takes place. As far as healing, I mean real healing, I think the impact of intense magnetic fields on the water at the cellular level causes the changes that lead to improvement. Since all the cells fission and split on the basis of several stimuli in its environment, I think the magnets may orient the cells in ways that cause bad cells to have retarded growth. But, as long as no one can prove one way or the other, I guess we just keep speculating.