Book Review: Healing With Magnets By Gary Null, Ph.D. 

Is healing with magnets a viable alternative to conventional medicine?

Since delving into the area of natural health in the mid 1990’s, I had heard off and on about magnet therapy. I was always a bit skeptical about it, however, as I would occasionally hear a disparaging comment about magnets even from the natural health and wellness community.

Healing With Magnets by Gary Null has cured me of my skepticism.

The book was a bit difficult for me to get into, as the beginning chapters consist of dryly written technical information. For example, Null spends time explaining the differences between pulsed and fixed magnetic therapy, and electromagnetic fields and fixed magnet fields.

Why magnets enhance health and healing

My interest picked up when he mentioned the fact that the human body was designed to be surrounded by magnetic fields. After all, when we were first created, we had no floors, shoes, or concrete between our feet and the earth. Our ancestors slept not on beds separated by a foundation, floor and a box spring, but on the ground.

The modern-day separation of our bodies from the Earth’s magnetic core, Null implies, contributes to our ill state of health. In the absence of a magnetic field, the energy level of atoms plummets. As well, nutrients become polarized and can’t be used by the body.

When I read that, I was sold. Over the past few years, I have become more and more convinced that illness and disease result in large part to nutritional deficiencies. That our deficiencies may be connected to a weakened personal magnetic field intrigued me.

How magnets are used

 I continued on in Healing With Magnets. Null began his list of therapeutic uses for magnets, and why the magnets work. Some of those uses include

• pain relief: magnets relieve pain by slowing the signal of pain along the nerve.
•  anti-microbial effects: magnets lower acidity in the blood and oxygenate white blood cells (the workhorses of the immune system).
•  reduction of inflammation (e.g., arthritis): the injured/diseased tissue emits a positive charge, so the negative pole of a magnet restores the tissue’s natural balance.

Magnets can be used for conditions ranging from asthma to cancer to fibromyalgia to rheumatoid arthritis.

Null is careful to point out that magnets should never be used a the sole therapy in treating any disease, but should be part of an overall treatment plan.

However, if you have acute pain, such as a headache or menstrual cramps, you have a good chance of eliminating the pain merely by applying the right strength of magnet. No ibuprofen needed.

The last part of Healing With Magnets was the most fun to read—the testimonials.

• Lee said that he has been much more alert while driving long distances since he began sitting on a magnetic pad in the car.
• Cindy had asthma for years, and was finally healed after wearing a magnet around her neck.
• Susan weaned herself off her thyroid and allergy medications after wearing a magnet for a while. As a bonus, her spider veins disappeared as well.
• Betty had multiple sclerosis for thirty years. A few days after she began sleeping on a magnetic mattress pad, she was able to sleep for only three to six hours per night and wake up with no pain.

I closed the book, happy I had persevered until the end. Convinced that I had been neglecting an important area of health care, I talked my husband into letting me buy a magnetic mattress pad. 

We slept on it for a few nights, and then talked about it. 

Both of us were waking up less frequently, and feeling like we were sleeping more deeply. I noticed, particularly, that when I did wake up I was being pulled back into sleep a lot more quickly than before. And both of us noticed less tiredness in the afternoons. 

May I coach you? Healing with magnets, however "different" it sounds, is not quackery. If you have any chronic or degenerative disease, or your just not sleeping well or long enough at night, magnet therapy may be the right choice for you.

Disclaimer: You should not use magnetic therapy products if you are wearing a pacemaker, defibrillator, any other implanted electro-medical device, estrogen or other patches or if you are pregnant.