Vibration Plate Machines Really Do Help One Lose Weight

In earlier times we used to laugh at movies of wide belt machines doing their best to remove cellulite and excess fat from rotund ladies in bathing costumes. Now, it seems, vibrations really do have an effect – though not, probably, on cellulite. A study was presented at the European Congress on Obesity that evaluated the effectiveness of the Power Plate® (a vibration plate machine) in obese people.

Belgian researchers enrolled 60-odd overweight or obese people – mostly women – into a one-year study. They were allocated to one of 4 groups: a calorie-restricted diet under dietician supervision, but no exercise program allowed; the same dietary regime, plus supervised exercise classes (aerobics and some strengthening exercises); the dietary regime plus supervised Power Plate training instead of conventional exercise; and no intervention at all. The interventions were for 6 months, after which the participants were to do the best they could with a healthy diet and exercise regime without any supervision.

The vibration machine exercises were done under physical therapist supervision; sessions lasted 12 minutes in the first 3 months, and 14 minutes in the second 3 months.

In the first 6 months, the diet only group lost 6% of their weight, diet-plus-exercise group lost 7%, the vibration group lost 11%, and the ‘no intervention’ group gained 1.5%. After the full year, diet alone couldn’t maintain a 5% loss in weight, whereas the diet-plus-exercise kept off a 6.9% loss. The vibration group maintained a 10.5% loss, and the ‘no intervention’ continued a 1.5% increase.

More important than the weight loss itself was where it was lost from. After the full year, the diet alone group had lost7.5 cm² of belly fat, diet-plus-exercise lost 1.6 cm², and the vibration group lost an average of 47.7 cm². (Note: the cm² results were obtained from CT scans of abdominal fat, and presumably were proportional to the amount of fat actually lost in that area.)

These findings show that, if confirmed in further studies, the vibrating plate has a future in helping people lose abdominal fat, the worst sort of fat from a health point of view. But it’s not just a matter of standing still while the machine does all the work. There are at least 22 different positions you can take, for up to a minute each. And a personal Power Plate starts at about $2,000.