Saturday, November 28, 2020

Healy: A TENS Unit with 50% more Woo

 

 I was in a car accident 17 years ago (hit from behind by a drunk driver.) Part of my physical therapy involved using a TENS unit on my back. At the time, TENS units were only available directly from licensed therapists- to get mine, I had to put down a refundable $200 deposit and pay $20 per month for the three months I had it. It was pretty easy to use, and I got good at placing the sticky electrode things just right to send pulses into my back and ease muscle pain.

Some years later, I found a TENS unit available through a pharmacy in England, where they let you buy them off the shelf because, after all, it's not medication, it's not addictive and it's not all about making the company that owns the TENS trademark rich.  It cost me $40.  It still works more than a decade later, though I've purchased a new one recently (from America, because times change) so I can have a set at home and in Vermont for when I visit (it can be a pain to get these things through airport security.)

Anyway, what about this thing which uses "vibrations" to "solve" (not cure) all kind of "issues" we can have with our bodies?  Well, the people who made this thing are being both super-clever and super-sleazy at the same time.  This item is, in fact, FDA Approved- as a TENS unit.  It doesn't read your chakras (because you don't have any) or align your feng shui (because that's nonsense, too.)  It just sends electrical impulses into your body.  Because that's what a TENS unit does.  But this thing runs upwards of TWO THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS.  That's something your everyday TENS unit does NOT do.  It doesn't cost you an arm and a leg.  This thing costs an arm, a leg and probably one of your ears.  For a TENS unit.  Come on!!

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