ABSTRACT
The use of electricity, interestingly, is almost as old as acupuncture. As early as 2750 B.C. individuals were exposed to shocks produced by electric eels (1). Static electricity was created by rubbing amber at least as early as 400 B.C. Modern medical electrotherapy, however, began in the late 1700s. A wide variety of electrotherapy devices were patented throughout the nineteenth century. Unfortunately, the Flexner Report in 1910 almost wiped out electrotherapy and except for the fortuitous discovery of a naturopathic invention, the Electreat, we might not have modern electrotherapy. In 1919, C.W.Kent of Peoria, Illinois patented the Electreat, which came to the attention of Shealy at a time when he was introducing the concept of dorsal column stimulation (DCS) and resurrected the Electreat in clinical trials in the mid-1960s (2).
