And finally, for added comfort it would be best to have a piece of cloth or fabric that is wrapped a round the area where you will be placing the magnet onto. There are still a lot to be learned about magnet therapy. Its application to practical medicine still receives frowns and smirks from some members of the medical community. However, since only one area is being used to penetrate the body you probably will need a very strong magnet to achieve significant results. This is where people who use bipolar magnets say that they have an advantage. By using two kinds of magnetic polarity, a magnetic field is created strong enough to go inside the body or affected area to induce treatment. Rheumatoid arthritis A double blind, controlled trial of patients with rheumatoid arthritis of the knee compared the effects of strong alternating polarity magnets with the effects of a deliberately weak unipolar magnet. After a week of therapy, 68% of the participants with the strong magnet reported relief, compared to 27% in the control group. Drooping shoulders In cases of drooping shoulders (one side is dropped and the other is raised), magnets can do the right corrections. The lowered end of the shoulders needs the strengthening north-pointing pole. The end that is raised should be applied with a south-pointing end of the magnet to correct the imbalance. In addition, it had been determined that the therapy has no known risks. Also, there were no traces of side effects in all the magnet therapy treatments that were tested. The following conditions are found to react favorably to magnet therapy treatments. There were noted reductions of pain and other discomforts in cases of arthritis, post-operations headaches (migraine) and pre-operations insomnia. In the same study, it was found that patients who slept on magnetic mattresses had greater pain relief than those who slept on ordinary mattresses. Diabetic neuropathy At the New York Medical College of Valhalla, magnetic foot pads, more than the nonmagnetic ones, were found effective in relieving numbness and pain associated with this diabetes-related problem.