Resting blood pressure increase during exposure to a radio-frequency electromagnetic field

Abstract

With the increasing use of cellular telephones, the potential influences of radio-frequency electromagnetic fields (EMF) on human well-being are a focus of public interest. Seven healthy men and three women volunteers aged between 26 and 36 years underwent a single-blind placebo-controlled protocol to investigate the influence of the EMF of a mobile telephone (GSM 900 MHz, 2 Watt, 217 Hz frame repetition rate) on blood pressure (BP), heart rate (HR), capillary perfusion (CP), and subjective well-being. The telephone was fixed in a typical position on the right-hand side of the head and operated by remote control, so that the volunteer did not know whether or not the phone emitted EMF. BP and HR were measured continuously with a Finapres device and CP with an infrared plethysmograph on the right hand. The protocol was divided into phases with placebo and with EMF exposure of 35 min each. A fixed sequence was chosen instead of a randomised order,