um, Hello, and welcome to Podiatry.
Practice Mastery Don Paltrow here and I have dr.
Ben Pearl here. Welcome then, hey, nice to
sorry, I'm done. Good good.
And today, we are going to chat a little bit about
electromagnetic therapy. It kind of seems like Voodoo to
me. Everyone's have these new
therapies and I kind of say, tell me a little bit, how you
got interested in this and kind of what your, what it's been
doing for your practice first. Let me jump off the voodoo
syrupy. Because I think that is very
accurate to what people's impression limitations are.
Yeah. Magnetism, you know, when they
came out with those, magnetic insoles, I think in the late
80s, early 90s the Gauss, which is the the energy unit is maybe
like half a Gauss if that in and one of those insoles.
So you have to have some energy to effect a change.
So like we jump up To an MRI unit, which has several thousand
gals. And there's a huge jump between,
you know, what is basically an ineffective in Seoul, because
there's just not enough charge there to do much versus an
office-based unit where you're actually hearing a ping just
like you would win an MRI unit of the cycle of the magnetic
amplitude, up and down, and you hear that.
It's very interesting. And you'll, I'm gonna And as
we're talking ecstatic, feeling I'm going to share my screen.
So this is an example of the machine that we're talking about
here. And once again we're not going
to try to write selling this one.
We're just kind of talking about it because I think it's I like
to bring in new technology. This is kind of the machine.
You kind of put your foot in here and kind of how it works
and if you want I'll put a link underneath this show if you guys
want to look more about this machine and this is kind of some
of the advantages and things like that and some some videos
and Ben's practice. But so tell us a little bit more
about it than kind of how you got.
Sit in it, how it's affected your practice hauling.
You've been using it things like that.
Well, there's some been some major manufacturers that have
been using these for a while and some of my colleagues have been
using some of the units and I looked around at some different
Technologies. And I found one that fit my
practice profile and, you know, there's a lot of different
things price point, efficacy, things that you need to kind of
feel out and I started using the unit, and let's just start with
the basic principle, the base. Asic principle is that with all
these regenerative energies, your priming the the breakdown
of ATP to ADP. And in the case of
electromagnetism, it's a hydrolysis situation.
And once that ATP goes to ADP, a packet of energy is released and
the cells that are deficient use that energy to heal.
Now, in addition with things that are charged related like
nerd, Earth and Bone, which has a piece of genic effect.
So even when we're walking were affecting a charge, very low
mind you. But that has been talked about
with one of the essential elements with the ions that are
necessary for bone healing. When we have fracture healing,
just mechanical pressure can create a small electric charge
feel and we have these ions in our body, our bodies that are
basically analogous to batteries that respond to charge.
And so not only do we get that packet of energy release but we
get buildup of priming, the circuit of nerve conduction
which which also can be primed by electric energy,
electromagnetic, energy, and electromagnetic energy is
different than like traditional galvanic.
Stim in that the magnetism goes at a deeper level that level
penetrates at something related to Newton's inverse Square law.
So the depth of penetration is much greater than like a
superficial TENS unit. That's where you get the Deep
charge. That helps with bone healing.
That helps with sprains that helps with wound healing, that
helps with neuropathy. These are all things that I've
been using it for good. So let's let's bring it really
down. Literally far down, let's say
I'm a patient and you, if you just said that to me, I wouldn't
understand. And I still don't understand
anything you said, so I come in with An ankle sprain, I come in
with plantar fasciitis. You know, how do you use this on
those things and how do you explain it to the patient in
conjunction with all the other stuff that we could offer?
Like cortisone, Shockwave, all these other types of things?
I absolutely do. And the reason I do is that it
is a touchless therapy, so even when considering a night I still
love Shockwave for plantar fasciitis and achilles
tendinosis. However, I like this in that if
Somebody is super sensitive and I'm worried about beating him up
with like, let's say a radio shock way, which many of us have
in our offices because I think it's a great tool.
I don't want to knock that at all.
I think it's still a Workhorse of a tool.
The electromagnetism offers me, not as much pain for the patient
while the rendering the treatment.
So it's in effect, it almost feels like static, like you're
taking your laundry out of the dryer and it just has that
little Kind of prickly feeling that's it.
Now occasionally you'll get a little bit of a highlighting.
Let's say I used it on my iliopsoas, you know that front
flexor muscle that really gets tight when we're sitting down.
So I just use it and it really caused this oscillation.
I thought it was like what am I hit my femoral artery?
Or some because it was really pumping and I really felt the
deep penetration of the metal of the magnetic field.
Right after the treatment several hours later, you know,
it felt a little irritated but then the next day it loosened up
now with things. It's interesting because that
was like a, just a very sensitive area with things like
plantar, fasciitis. However, I find that there's
almost an immediate. Wow, that that is like,
interrupting that throbbing pain signal.
So there's also on pain gate Theory, which you know, about
where we inhibit the signals of Pain by offering another signal.
Hmm. Not only that but it has
different frequency waves, so it's not just one continuous
cycle. It's going 15 Hertz, it's going
7 Hertz. So in effect, it's sort of quote
tricking the body so that the body isn't habituating to one
pattern, it's throwing different stimuli at it.
Hmm. So that is at least a partial
explanation that the the inhibition of pain signals, you
know, at least in terms of pain, And then our blood has iron
which is also reactive to charge.
So you get this up regulation of circulation and I was talking to
you about a patient of mine that I suspect with gout and I don't
know how well and I think we talked about it I have these all
these videos up on my FIT foot use side so it would be it
easier to see the videos. They're the me to try to show
you the phone picture, but you literally see where the tow that
was Colin and this case guard typically affects the big toe.
He also had some ankle pain right at the base of the toe.
It was less pink. It was almost like model like
kind of skin tone and pink like mixed in because the swelling
had actually lessened right? Directly after the treatment.
When he got up out of the exam chair and this is typical
without any cortisone or anything, he said it was about
25% better and to me that's like a home run.
Hmm. Oftentimes, I will find it later
that day. Day.
They'll feel even better and then the trick is, how long does
it sustain? And how many treatments do we
need? Typically I'm only doing a few
treatments. I'm not like with some of the
laser options. Let's say for neuropathy, you're
doing 10 12 treatments, sometimes I am getting nice
neuropathy results, three to four treatments.
I'm not saying Don that I'm getting full recovery of
sensation. That's not what I'm talking
about. I'm talking about more movement
in the toes. When my dad But patients have a
lot of stiffness from the neuropathy that nose, his septum
of gnawing or burning pain is diminished significantly.
So those are those are the things and there's been by the
way, some NIH papers. I was looking at 1:00 this
morning so if you if you Google the Search terms you will find
some stuff that's reviewed by the NIH that particular study
I'm referring to is about 800 cows.
My unit I go up to about 3,300 3,000 to 3,500 gals so You're
getting a quite a big bolus of energy in this technology.
You told me the name again. What's the generic name for it?
Okay, there's several generic names.
The one that most people are familiar with and if you Google
it you're going to find all kinds of devices sold on Amazon,
that are lower Gauss units. Those are home-based or
wearables or mats, and the term is pimp pulsed, electromagnetic
frequency, okay? And so, it's a in a pulsed
fashion and electromagnet obviously refers to the energy
source. Now, the units that are
available for a medical office are going to be a much higher
level of gals and insults and their different trade names.
And I'm not going to put, you know, which one is with which,
but there's EMT t-there's p.m. St.
And I'm not even going to mention any of, I don't want to
get into advertising, but here's are different.
Higher levels of Health than the ones that you would get.
Let's say, you know, ordering off Amazon, you know, for a
smaller unit interesting. So, I know there's always a lot
of different types of treatments for, for example, plantar
fasciitis, and other types of things.
What's your experience in terms of fitting it into your
workflow. Like, for example, for
Shockwave, I might three do three shock waves and then do a
six-week break and Another three if I need to or do for you.
Do it like in conjunction with shockwave.
Are you doing it in conjunction with cortisone?
Are you just doing it a standalone?
How long do the treatments? Take do they sit there and you
put their foot in there. You can leave and see another
patient. How does it go with the with the
ones? Yeah, that's a great question.
First of all, both with shockwave and with
electromagnetic treatments, I do not mix and match cortisone
because I feel that's doing the opposite.
It's throwing the, the teeth. Cells away.
And we want to bring we want to bring those cells to the area.
These things up regulate, the growth hormones and upregulate
the helper cells, the T helper cells coming to the area to
induce tissue repair. I was reading a study of this
morning about wound healing and they were looking at zinc and
how electromagnetism is used in conjunction with zinc as a no.
Zion to help promote healing. So they were using both and
that's the other thing that I'm going to be looking at.
I was talking to you about this, like, things like warts where I
do candida injections, and I'm just hitting that spot wart with
this help, profuse it more. I think so.
So, I think that there would be an opportunity to maybe even get
a bigger blanket effect from the candida potentially.
And I've even used this done with situations, where I have a
very swollen, ingrown toenail, and it's one of my You know,
blue collar workers, they got to get back to the workforce.
This is their day off. So I say, you know, mr.
Jones, this is, this, might, this injection might be
difficult for me to do, but here's here's something I can do
for you. I can do and of course, this is
a cash proposition. There is no insurance code for
this particular type therapy. Delayed unions nonunions.
Yes, you can order the units. That would be insurance cover.
Not my unit though, that doesn't fall under the same code.
So I offer that to them as an option, we can lessen the
swelling. And in fact, I will even after I
do the injection to perfuse, the injection, put them back in the
ring. Hmm, why do perfuse the
anesthetic? So that I obtain a better block
and I'm not charging the same amount because this is kind of
an auxiliary procedure to the main procedure.
Yes, you know, the intro job sometimes, what I'll do to is,
I'll say, look, we can get you some immediate relief.
Message, you know, mrs. Jones.
I'd rather you do thing antibiotic your your toe is
swollen. It's going to be hard to drive
this in. I know that, you know, pain is
difficult for you. Let's do a treatment today just
to take the ebb and flow down a little bit on the swelling.
And then come back and see me in 56 days.
After you've been on, let's say the oral Keflex and then let's
do the procedure. So I've done it both ways.
Hmm. You know, I find in our
Practices as we were, if you're interested in learning new
treatments, I tend to find that there.
It can be overwhelming and trying to explain so many
treatments. You really need to kind of hone
in on like or do a package. Say like okay, we have this
plantar fasciitis package, you're going to get Shockwave
with this added on or just call it whatever it is.
You're regenerative package versus because if you explain
Shockwave then I'm going to do this electromagnetic and then
you're going to do all these other things.
I think it gets confusing for patients with too many options.
It gets too complex. Which one do you choose?
Do you do packages or do you just say, hey, you know, I'm
going to try this and then we'll try the next thing.
We'll try the next thing. Exactly to your point what I've
been now introducing done is instead of going and and, you
know, we all have our preconceived notions like oh
gosh. I've been doing real shock wave
for plantar fasciitis. It's been working out pretty
well. What I like about this is, I can
lower the price point slightly, why?
Because it's not like it's I'm not going into Check on them, I
do but I can set that ring up semi unattended.
Let's just call it like that. Then I can come back and say you
know what, I want to take up the amplitude a little bit, I'm
going to increase the Gauss, go up to 80% let's say as opposed
to 60% take it up a little bit. But I'm basically working with
another patient in another room. You asked about workflow.
Yeah. So it's basically adding a
technical assistant that isn't a person too.
That has been the Revolutionary thing.
You know, the shockwaves I am doing them myself as most people
do. I don't know too many states
where you can have a tech do that sort of thing, but at any
rate apart from that discussion, it frees up my time.
And so I am now using this as my primary go to it's become sort
of my Swiss army knife in my practice and I'm not saying that
things like laser and Shockwave aren't still useful.
I just prefer with the management.
As an intro treatment, I know it's not going to hurt him.
Generally that this has just been a great tool and then if
I'm not, let's say getting any Delta, any change?
Then I say, you know, we'll do maybe a couple of these and then
maybe let's try a radio shock wave.
So I don't have a particular formulaic because I find that my
patients respond differently, even with the same clinical
entity, two different things. Some people are just seem to be
more Biologically receptive to electromagnetism than others but
it's been, I would say. And this sounds crazy, but like
80 to 90 percent of my patients are responding in some positive
way, even if it's minimal. Yeah, yes.
I haven't had too many that like, oh my gosh, it hurts them
and I had that happen occasionally with laser even
shock wave where they say, you know what it really hurts after
in that. And then you have to explain,
that's part of the healing. Ling process, we're trying to
recruit. Thanks to the area.
Etc, break up Scar Tissue. Cool.
Been I I'm gonna, I'll put a little link underneath here of
your your website where they can learn more about it and let
people search it out. That's what I like about talking
about his new technology. I know in early January, you're
having a something on biomechanics.
That's another area. So, tell us a little bit about
that as we finish up. And then any last words.
Yeah, so, it's going to be really great.
I'm going to have one of my new Heroes.
And I'm going to pump his book, Richard, Richard Blake, he's
done now the second edition which I've previewed and Don, I
call this book and he'll be one of the featured speakers on two
things. One a limb length discrepancy,
and then he's going to do just sort of a general, his bio
mechanical approach but it's kind of like a gold key book.
I mean, it's got so many pictures.
It's cross-referenced. You know, he'll talk.
Talk about something on tarsal tunnel and then jump over to
Morton's, neuroma and talk about, you know, ways that you
can do neuro release and neural flossing as it's called, you
know, I didn't even know much about neural flossing but then
he describes and has pictures of the extension, flexion of the
toes. And so, you know, you look at
the pictures and and it's just really a good for the layperson,
as well as the season practitioner.
So, he'll be there to have this. I'm embarked old is always
entertaining from Australia, will be talking about
Innovations in shoes. I've got, you know, from kind of
more of the Barefoot Science, World golden Harper.
He's one of the developers of the altar shoes.
We've got Nach chocolate ham from England.
So it's an international thing. He's going to be talking about
things related to shearing and some other biomechanic metrics.
He's a PhD in biomechanics, so it's going to be really good at
genuine 19th and you An email me at Arlington footage email and I
know you'll provide the link and it's a nominal charge for
everything. That's been involved in putting
it together and it's virtual. So you can sit there in the
comfort of your home and be in your PJs and have your hot cocoa
or whatever and just enjoy and listening great.
Okay, been well, thank you for all that work.
Putting that together I know whenever you try to do an event
it's like hurting hurting cats. And so it's not an easy thing.
It really isn't. I appreciate you, you know.
In the word and I hope, you know.
In fact I'll give you a comp on that just because, you know,
we've been working together if you want to attend and I think
it would be good even and I'll have it post-production, it'll
be available will be a senior. Why?
If you're watching this after you guys can check it out and
until next time, okay? Ben.
Yeah, man. I wanted to leave on a comical
note. It's been a serious year.
So I thought I'd invoke a little Sly Stallone on what he'd maybe
say about magnets and you'd say, in law, I don't know, magnets,
you know, I don't think I met a good guy from South Philly.
I think you had a magnet in his head, but uh, you know, I'm
going to try to stick around it. This year, peace out.
Thanks. Ben on the fly.
All right, good to see old on Happy New Year.
Happy New Year, everybody. Thank you.