Would electromagnetic fields not help with osteoporosis?
Friday, April 11th, 2008
hound9_4 asked:
What I have heard of, from time to time, is that bones grow faster and denser in the presence of electromagnetic fields. This is supposedly the reason that doing weight-bearing exercise is good for increasing bone density and building bone mass; bones are apparently piezoelectric materials, and when stressed, produce their own EM fields. I have also heard of treatments for broken bones where a cast is wired and the wires connected to batteries, so that the bones heal much faster and are denser than they would be otherwise.
What I have heard of, from time to time, is that bones grow faster and denser in the presence of electromagnetic fields. This is supposedly the reason that doing weight-bearing exercise is good for increasing bone density and building bone mass; bones are apparently piezoelectric materials, and when stressed, produce their own EM fields. I have also heard of treatments for broken bones where a cast is wired and the wires connected to batteries, so that the bones heal much faster and are denser than they would be otherwise.
How true is this? Can we use this to combat osteoporosis by placing people at risk of osteoporosis in weak electromagnetic fields?
Aaron
