283Magnetic Fields for Pain Control
edema causes delayed healing and chronic pain. Edema reduction is an important target for PRF
and PEMF applications.
Double-blind clinical studies have now been reported for chronic wound repair, acute ankle
sprains, and acute whiplash injuries. PRFs have been found to accelerate reduction of edema in
acute ankle sprains by up to vefold (Pennington et al., 1993). Some of the best responses to PRFs
appear to be during or immediately after the treatment of acute soft tissue injuries. For bone repair,
while not commonly used for this purpose, limited experience shows that responses to PRFs are
signicantly slower. The voltage changes induced by PRF at binding sites in macromolecules affect
ion binding kinetics ...