VAUGHAN, ONT. — At first glance, this facility located in a strip mall north of Toronto has all the trappings of a regular gym: flat-screen televisions, medicine balls and sweatpant-clad women.
Stick around, though, and you'll notice a major difference: Nobody is sweating. In fact, the aspiring fitness buffs are barely moving. They're just standing on metal plates ... vibrating.
"It's about letting the machines do the work for you," said Jasper Singh, a chiropractor and owner of WAVE Vibration Exercise and Nutrition, which opened in Vaughan last month.
That promise -- muscle tone at the press of a few buttons -- is what's helping to drive the rapidly expanding and unregulated world of "whole body vibration exercise."
Joe Scherer, a kinesiologist, positions Gina Cappelli, 76, to do some whole body vibration exercise. (Fred Lum/The Globe and Mail)
The vibration devices, which often look like a stair climber except that there's a metal platform where the steps would be, are now being used across Canada in fitness clubs, physiotherapy clinics and home gyms.
Health club members spend hundreds of dollars to stand on a platform and jiggle for a maximum of 15 minutes, three to four times a week. Some do squats or pushups while they vibrate, for a deeper burn.
The results, proponents say, can be incredible: improved balance, flexibility, circulation, muscle strength and weight loss. Company websites tout scientific studies supporting their health benefits. And numerous celebrities and professional athletes have endorsed the devices, including Canadian figure-skating champion Elvis Stojko and Tour de France star Lance Armstrong.
Brenda Hurlburt, a 57-year-old retired bank manager from Oakville, Ont., says she gained mobility in her right knee, which had stiffened up from surgery, after only two weeks of vibration exercise.
"Then I lost a pant size - and that was a real bonus," said Ms. Hurlburt during a recent visit to Mr. Singh's studio.
Dozens of companies, most started in the past few years, now sell the machines online. They range in price from $400 for home models to $18,000 for deluxe ones used in gyms and clinics.
"The interest is growing daily," said Judy Pedersen, president of Calgary-based Motion Health Inc., Canadian distributor of the VibraFlex series of devices, which cost $5,400 for a home model and $16,000 for a higher-end edition.
But the devices may not deliver on all those promises. Some researchers say that while initial findings look promising, more research is needed.
"There haven't been enough studies actually documenting the effects to show that this is comparable to exercise - or is half as good, or twice as good," said Peter Lemon, a kinesiology professor and director of the University of Western Ontario's Exercise Nutrition Research Laboratory, who has been studying the devices over the past year.
Others are concerned about safety standards, warning that the products can be harmful if not used properly.
"There's a lot of people out there trying to make a quick buck," said Josh Wiebe, owner of Simple Body Concepts, a small gym in Red Deer, Alta., that focuses exclusively on vibration workouts. About 30 clients have bought $1,850 one-year passes at his gym, which two years ago was one of Red Deer's first vibration exercise facilities. Now there are seven facilities, Mr. Wiebe said.
He creates customized workout programs for clients who range from college athletes to older people with limited mobility. But he worries about gyms that may be less reputable, or people who buy machines off the Internet without quality guarantees, and use them at home without supervision.
"There's no protocol for the industry right now,"? Mr. Wiebe said. "If the people training you don't know much about it, it can do more harm than good."
Doctors and therapists have long treated the negative effects of "whole body vibration" on workers who operate planes, tractors, forklifts and heavy equipment such as jackhammers. Even short-term exposure to vigorous vibration can produce a long list of health problems, including chest pain and loss of balance.
Long-term exposure can cause serious health problems such as herniated discs, scoliosis, gastrointestinal disorders and degenerative spinal changes.
How vibration affects the body depends on the frequency of the vibration, how much up-and-down displacement there is and the duration of exposure.
Vibrating exercise machines operate at frequencies that are well within industrial safety limits, proponents say, and users are advised to jump on for seven- to 15-minute sessions - nowhere near the duration of a work day. And while the displacement on a jackhammer may be 15 centimetres, most exercise devices are in the millimetre range.
"They're just two different things," said Larry Leigh, director of research and training at WAVE Manufacturing Inc., a Windsor, Ont.-based company that manufactures devices and operates a fitness centre in Windsor and the new one in Vaughan.
Dr. Leigh, who has a PhD in exercise physiology and is an instructor at the University of Windsor, says the machines work by generating multiple tiny contractions within muscles.
Pregnant women and people with active cancers or infections shouldn't use the devices, he said.
But he added that research is now taking the vibration platforms in exciting directions. Studies are looking at how the technology may be used to help patients with spinal chord injuries, fibromyalgia, cerebral palsy and other chronic conditions.
Dr. Lemon - who organized the Canadian Society of Exercise Physiology's annual conference last month where whole body vibration exercise was a featured topic - said the technology could one day help mobility-restricted seniors or people with injuries needing rehabilitation.
Still, he said, the devices don't have cardiovascular benefits and can't replace a good five-kilometre jog.
"People are interested because, gee, all you do is stand on this thing," he said. "If we could bottle the effects of exercise and sell it as a tonic, everyone would buy it."
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