Any experience with PEMF therapy (Magna Wave, etc.)? I know some riders that have said it is wonderful but I wanted to go to a bigger audience and get some more feed back.
The only magnetic device in the whole, wide world that has been proven to affect living tissue is the MRI. It does so with a honking-big magnet. The small magnets sold in any form of “magnetic therapy” have no evidence of ever affecting living tissue.
There is a whole world of “anecdotal testimonials” praising some device as the Greatest Thing Ever. But that’s not “data.” There is no “data” to support the theory.
Your money, your choice.
G.
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I ditto Guilherme !
My friend and former trainer has become a PEMF practitioner in my area. She and and a lot of my friends/acquaintances have been singing its praises, calling it borderline miraculous.
Personally, I’m still very, very skeptical. And considering the cost of a single session, I’m willing to hang on to that skepticism until I see some actual data.
If there were some physical evidence of magnetism’s ability to affect living tissue with a force short of the MRI then I would think that would have been demonstrated by now. There are plenty of modern diagnostic tools to detect such changes; yet, nothing.
Magnetism is a wonderful force for lots of things (compasses, generating electricity, holding stuff on the refrigerator, etc.). Curing illnesses or injuries, however, is not one of them.
G.
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G, this is one time I completely agree with you.
Additionally, if you read the literature provided by the PEMF companies, their scientific reasoning is terrible.
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I’ve used a friend’s electromagnetic blanket which is rather old and I don’t know if it even has a brand. (It does pulse, I can feel it.) It seemed to help with an unknown hip injury on my horse. Most horses that I’ve put it on have done the licking and chewing thing. I’ve wondered if the magnetic blankets being sold now have the same effect.
Also, many moons ago I got stepped on at the track and a vet put a machine on my foot that made the swelling disappear. She said the machine created a magnetic field in my foot–I didn’t feel any pulsing from it.
If the little fridge magnets they put in these blankets actually worked, my recent hip MRI should have cured everything that ails me. Alas, my soft tissue tear in my hip is still there…
I am a vet and have no problem with integrative medicine, but at least use something that works.
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I used a magnawave on my knee a few years ago. It did nothing. Shockwave on the other hand, cured my muckers elbow with two treatments
Oh, I don’t know. We had a magnawave at the barn I boarded at through high school and it was useful. You could tell the horses liked it and I think it did help with sore muscles. One of the other local trainers would stop by to use it on her knee and it allowed her to start riding again after years and years of too much knee pain.
I wouldn’t bother with the blankets and such, but if I lived near a magnawave again I’d employ it. The sessions weren’t anymore expensive than massage or bodywork.
We had the use of a P3 machine for a horse who was prone to back muscle pain due to an injury to his pelvis. It is a coil that you hold and move around over the treatment area. You could feel the pulse and watch his back muscles twitch as you moved the coil around. This horse loved it and it certainly made a difference in his life.
It isn’t the same as a magnetic blanket, we also have one of those. The blanket does seem to relax the horses to where they chew and lick their lips. I doubt that it cures anything, but it seems to feel good to the horses and that’s OK too.
I have a Respond blanket for my horse. I don’t think it can heal injuries, but it definitely loosens tight muscles and he warms up MUCH quicker after using it than without.
We have a new working student at our barn and she sometimes starts my horse so I can watch (we have a history of NQR stuff and I like to watch him go periodically). I used the blanket a couple of times last week without telling her and on both occasions, she remarked on how loose he felt and how quickly he got to work.
[QUOTE=SBrentnall;8536746]
I have a Respond blanket for my horse. I don’t think it can heal injuries, but it definitely loosens tight muscles and he warms up MUCH quicker after using it than without.
We have a new working student at our barn and she sometimes starts my horse so I can watch (we have a history of NQR stuff and I like to watch him go periodically). I used the blanket a couple of times last week without telling her and on both occasions, she remarked on how loose he felt and how quickly he got to work.[/QUOTE]
Any blanket will keep heat in and cause the horse to “warm” more quickly.
G.
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[QUOTE=Guilherme;8537242]
Any blanket will keep heat in and cause the horse to “warm” more quickly.
G.[/QUOTE]
Do you know what a Respond blanket is? It’s a mesh sheet with coils over each major muscle group. So it’s not a blanket, per se. Without being turned on, it provides no more warming than a fly sheet.
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We had an electromagnetic blanket at a barn I used to manage. Every horse we used it on would visibly relax by dropping, licking, chewing, and even falling asleep, so they seemed to enjoy it.
Not sure about the medical effects, but I did do an experiment on a chronic bucker. I suspected hock pain might be the cause of his bucking, and so I started putting him in the hock attachments for the blanket before some of his rides. He would normally buck every time he was asked to canter, but he did not buck on the days he had worn the blanket. We made no other changes to his routine and the rider was not informed as to whether the horse had worn the blanket or not that day.
I was pretty convinced it did something for him because of that, but what and how much are anyone’s guess. He was largely untrainable for his owner due to his extreme bucking up until that point, so it was a significant change in behavior.
[QUOTE=SBrentnall;8537279]
Do you know what a Respond blanket is? It’s a mesh sheet with coils over each major muscle group. So it’s not a blanket, per se. Without being turned on, it provides no more warming than a fly sheet.[/QUOTE]
I looked at a picture of one. It appeared to be a nylon blanket with some sort of attachments. The detail was not sufficient to see what they were. I presume they are some sort of electrical apparatus.
When it turns on do the coils generate heat?
G.
[QUOTE=Guilherme;8537447]
I looked at a picture of one. It appeared to be a nylon blanket with some sort of attachments. The detail was not sufficient to see what they were. I presume they are some sort of electrical apparatus.
When it turns on do the coils generate heat?
G.[/QUOTE]
The sheet is actually mesh, and it has pockets that contain coils. There’s a battery pack that provides power. When turned on, it doesn’t generate heat, but acts kind of like those Slenderzone units you used to see for people. Muscles that are tight often twitch a little as current is applied.
After I hurt my back, I used to plug in an attachment and wrap it around my back. It was an odd feeling - kind of like someone was plucking at tendons. It didn’t feel bad, just odd. But it generally stopped my back spasms.
I just saw PEMF performed on a horse and the practitioner used it on my back. It’s quite different from any magnetic blanket. It reminds me of something used at the chiropractor’s office or perhaps in a massage therapy session. I can see how it would release pressure points, and relax muscle tension. It sure did feel good on my back!
[QUOTE=SBrentnall;8538073]
The sheet is actually mesh, and it has pockets that contain coils. There’s a battery pack that provides power. When turned on, it doesn’t generate heat, but acts kind of like those Slenderzone units you used to see for people. Muscles that are tight often twitch a little as current is applied.
After I hurt my back, I used to plug in an attachment and wrap it around my back. It was an odd feeling - kind of like someone was plucking at tendons. It didn’t feel bad, just odd. But it generally stopped my back spasms.[/QUOTE]
So is this doing something more like what a TENS unit would do on a person? PT used one on my shoulder after it was injured last year, and it did feel GREAT. Especially combined with heat. I can definitely see how something like that would help a horse with tight muscles. Are what a lot of these “pulsed magnetic blankets” doing really acting as a TENS for the horse, so that the effect is coming from that muscle stimulation, not so much the “magnetic” properties?
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Exactly - the term “magnetic blanket” is a bit misleading. These work exactly like TENS units.
When you’re looking at “magnetic” blankets, an easy way to tell them apart is the price. A static magnetic blanket might cost a couple of hundred dollars. My Respond PEMF blanket cost $5000 and took me 18 months to pay off.
