Possible Effects of Electromagnetic Fields on the Nervous — Endocrine — Immune Interactions

Abstract

In recent years, complex interactions between the nervous, the endocrine and the immune system have been thoroughly investigated resulting in a large database of knowledge. On the other hand, the effectiveness of electromagnetic stimulation of the neurons has also been widely demonstrated, and the techniques of such stimulation are well established. A combination of the two knowledges offers a possibility to artificially influence the nervous - endocrine - immune (NEI) interactions, in cases when the immunity of a person is impaired, or its glandular functions are disordered. There is a wealth of reports on the use of electromagnetic fields to treat various pathological conditions. The number of diagnostic procedures that rely on the use of electromagnetic fields is also increasing. Therapeutic and diagnostic approaches include: surgical knife, cancer treatment (both hyperthermia and sub-hyperthermal EMF treatment, alone or in combination with other antitumor treatments), chronic and acute wound healing, bone healing, magnetic resonance imaging and spectroscopy, catheter ablation for cardiac arrhythmia, pain treatment, thermotherapy of musculo-skeletal tissue in physical medicine and rehabilitation, edema treatment, etc [1–5]. A number of these therapeutic procedures rely on excessive local heating of the tissue by means of radio frequency electromagnetic field. Other therapeutic procedures however do not have fully established mechanisms of EMFs. It is also very interesting that various signals in terms of amplitudes, pulse shape and frequencies are successfully used. At the moment a large database of EMF interactions with biological systems on various levels are available. Yet, due to very complex interactions between different levels, it is difficult if not impossible to explain reported therapeutic effects. Additional problem is that dosimetric determinations are only available in electrosurgery, catheter ablation, cancer hyperthermia and MR imaging and spectroscopy.