Does Electronic Muscle Stimulation (EMS) bring a benefit?

I wake up sore after a hard bender... never thought I built any muscle the night before though...

any science to that?

Well, if using it left the muscles sore then it exercised them somewhat.  My impression is that this method of activating the muscles will fall far short of traditional strengthening exercises in terms of muscle fitness.  It will also only stimulate the muscles that are receiving the rather shallow electrical impulse.  The core muscles are many and varied, with many of them too deep to be activated by the electrical pads.  So you WILL be missing many of the important cooperating core muscles.

I doubt EMS can result in satisfactory functional strength gains as an alternative to a traditional strengthening program.

I have one and use it for rehab.  For that I find it greatly useful.

The truth behind these products (and I read this from a reliable source, didn't just conclude this myself) is that they are marketed as fitness devices even though the manufacturers know they don't do this job...but if they market them as therapy devices they must be subject to very stringent, costly testing for the FDA.  So rather than marketing them as a 'medical' device, they market it as a fitness device when it's not in reality meant for that at all.

Nope, he drinks way too much, then pukes violently and the puking left his abs sore.

IMO they don't work.....

Stick to planking....

Did a pubmed search...

The short answer is no, it does not bring a benefit (see below).

-J

J Strength Cond Res. 2002 May;16(2):165-72.

Effects of electrical muscle stimulation on body composition, muscle strength, and physical appearance.

Porcari JP, McLean KP, Foster C, Kernozek T, Crenshaw B, Swenson C.

Electrical muscle stimulation devices (EMS) have been advertised to increase muscle strength, to decrease body weight and body fat, and to improve muscle firmness and tone in healthy individuals. This study sought to test those claims. Twenty-seven college-aged volunteers were assigned to either an EMS (n = 16) or control group (n = 11). The EMS group underwent stimulation 3 times per week following the manufacturer's recommendations, whereas the control group underwent concurrent sham stimulation sessions. Bilaterally, the muscles stimulated included the biceps femoris, quadriceps, biceps, triceps, and abdominals (rectus abdominus and obliques). An identical pre- and posttesting battery included measurements of body weight, body fat (via skinfolds), girths, isometric and isokinetic strength (biceps, triceps, quadriceps, hamstrings), and appearance (via photographs from the front, side, and back). EMS had no significant effect on the any of the measured parameters. Thus, claims relative to the effectiveness of EMS for the apparently healthy individual are not supported by the findings of this study.

**and***

Crit Care Med. 2011 Mar;39(3):456-61.

Effect of transcutaneous electrical muscle stimulation on muscle volume in patients with septic shock.

Abstract

OBJECTIVE:

Intensive care unit admission is associated with muscle wasting and impaired physical function. We investigated the effect of early transcutaneous electrical muscle stimulation on quadriceps muscle volume in patients with septic shock.

DESIGN:Randomized interventional study using a single-legged exercise design with the contralateral leg serving as a paired control.

SETTING: A mixed 18-bed intensive care unit at a tertiary care university hospital.

PATIENTS: Eight adult male intensive care unit patients with septic shock included within 72 hrs of diagnosis.

INTERVENTIONS: After randomization of the quadriceps muscles, transcutaneous electrical muscle stimulation was applied on the intervention side for 7 consecutive days and for 60 mins per day. All patients underwent computed tomographic scans of both thighs immediately before and after the 7-day treatment period. The quadriceps muscle was manually delineated on the computed tomography slices, and muscle volumes were calculated after three-dimensional reconstruction.

MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS: Median age and Acute Physiology and Chronic Health Evaluation II score were 67 years (interquartile range, 64-72 years) and 25 (interquartile range, 20-29), respectively. During the 7-day study period, the volume of the quadriceps muscle on the control thigh decreased by 16% (4-21%, p=.03) corresponding to a rate of 2.3% per day. The volume of the stimulated muscle decreased by 20% (3-25%, p=.04) corresponding to a rate of 2.9% per day (p=.12 for the difference in decrease). There was no difference in muscle volume between the stimulated and nonstimulated thigh at baseline (p=.10) or at day 7 (p=.12). The charge delivered to the muscle tissue per training session (0.82 [0.66-1.18] coulomb) correlated with the maximum sequential organ failure assessment score.

CONCLUSIONS: We observed a marked decrease in quadriceps volume within the first week of intensive care for septic shock. This loss of muscle mass was unaffected by transcutaneous electrical muscle stimulation applied for 60 mins per day for 7 days.

Great question.

The electro-stim used in physical therapy, i.e., after you have knee surgery or a back injury (had both) is characterized by physical therapists as providing a number of benefits that may include reducing muscle atrophy. I wager there are studies on line discussing that.

Electro stim also has... how do I say this... "adult recreational" applications with a growing number of specialty retailers serving that aspect of the market, although you have to know what you're doing, at least my friend told me that.

As for it developing abs or other muscles without doing any work. Hmmm. I can't say for sure beyond suggesting that, if it worked definatively, we wouldn't be discussing its feasability on an internet forum. We'd have been using it for years already.

Most folk call it Friday night.

Tom to your point of not work.

The difference is that I can just sit down and flex my abs (using my will/brain) or I can flex them stimulated through EMS.

In the latter case the flexing is even stronger.

So some work is being done...

I guess I will stick with it for a while and then see if I can confirm that there are no results.

I do have a before picture, so I will just need an after picture...

I think science is ahead of you on this.  And before-and-after pictures will not confirm anything.

What is this "SCIENCE" nonsense you are talking about?

Fixed it for you?

Actually, science is behind you. Too many folks have swallowed bad "data" w/o questioning that it's at least laudable to prove it to yourself. Just, I won't spend my $$ on this.

-J

Uh, this made me laugh out loud at my desk at work.

Questioning bad data is good (really, questioning anything can be a good practice).  But too many folks don't understand what proving it would actually entail.  (You can, of course, "prove" just about anything to yourself if you set your own "proof threshold" low enough.)

My point here is simple:

I have the thing at home.

There is internet data saying it does not work, but yet I definitely feel full muscle flexing and sore muscles.

So a self test is not going to hurt.

I was just wondering if anyone used it before.

At the end of the day it is not pleasant to use EMS, it is rather painful (just like flexing any other muscle full power). Though I can use the device easily while doing e-mails, logging food/workout data, watching TV.

My point is equally simple:

Use it if you like.  But you won't learn anything meaningful from your self test (other than you either enjoy it or you don't).  You have no baseline, no control, etc.

FWIW, I used it (under supervision) in college to help with an injury.  It did seem to help 'relax' the aggravated muscles for a bit after the stimulation.  But I don't know that it ever really helped address the injury.  My guess is 'not'.  But I have nothing to point to as evidence that it did or didn't.  Despite using it.

A self test is a great idea.  But testing via before/after photographs shouldn't work to validate or invalidate the experiment.  I say this because working the abdominal muscles in isolation won't have any effect on bodyfat (nor should it), therefore you won't see a change unless you also lost bodyfat which will have meant you didn't control the variables.

I would suggest 2 ways in which you could test the outcome of the experiment.  One is to use a functional measurement of strength, such as number of situps that can be performed in 60 seconds or 5 minutes (which is testing muscular endurance) or a single-rep max strength test but I can't immediately think of a good way to test that.

The other way is better but not feasible for you and that's to biopsy the muscle before and after and measure the size/density of the muscle cells.

The reason I think that's better than measuring strength is that working the muscles in this way removes the central nervous system from the activation of the muscles.  It could be that the muscles received a benefit from the artificial stimulation but strength might not improve in the process because your central nervous system didn't get any better at ordering the muscles to work.

My experiences with an EMS.

A friend let me borrow one about 10 years ago while I was in college.  I used it pretty regularly for a few weeks on my calves, quads, abs, and shoulders.  I was using it thinking it would help with muscle definition.  Well, after a few weeks, I returned it and had no reason to buy one myself.

My dad bought one to help with lower back and shoulder tightness/pain.  He used it for a couple of weeks, then it went in the closet and he used something else along the lines of foam rolling.

If these products really did work...I'm pretty sure my dad and I would still be using them. 

I use the Marc Pro EMS device. A guy on my triathlon team has one, so I've been using it. I actually really like it. It feels like a massage after using

The Marc Pro is not designed to build muscle, but rather helps with muscle recovery.  I don't know the exact science but it's supposed to engage your muscle to help your lymphatic system "flush" out your muscles after a workout.

+1 correct

just train and good luck