Explained: BIXEPS for Fat Loss, Seniors, Runners
The latest science on BIXEPS.
Three years ago, I featured Associate Professor Alfredo Franco-Obregón on my podcast.
Since then, I have been recommending BIXEPS to my clients.
Earlier this month, I started offering the service at my Evans Road location.
Hence, in this article, I will summarise how the device helps you if you belong to one of these groups:
People who want to lose visceral fat
Seniors
Runners
But first, let’s quickly introduce what the device does.
Pulsed Electromagnetic Field (PEMF) Therapy
The Straits Times succinctly states how it works:
“Protein activated by magnetic field-generating device can strengthen muscles - without exercise”
The technology is developed at the National University of Singapore, and you simply rest your leg in it for a few minutes to get health benefits.
Carefully tuned magnetic pulses (about 1 millitesla at 15 Hz) activate calcium-sensitive pathways in muscle cells. This engages the mechanism that exercise also relies on, the PGC-1α signalling pathway and the muscle’s mitochondrial network.
In other words, the muscle receives a signal that mimics, and in some cases amplifies, the cellular benefits of a workout.
This has multiple use cases, including benefits for three groups of clients I often see.
1. People Who Want to Lose Visceral Fat
Visceral fat is the kind that wraps around your organs deep inside your abdomen.
E.g. liver, pancreas, and intestines.
It is metabolically active, inflammatory, and strongly linked to diabetes, heart disease, and stroke.
Of note, many Southeast Asians carry comparatively high body fat — and visceral fat in particular — even at a normal body weight.
A Singapore study by Deurenberg-Yap and colleagues documented this ‘low BMI, high body fat’ paradox across Chinese, Malay, and Indian populations.
Reducing it meaningfully usually takes sustained, vigorous exercise rather than light activity alone.
That’s where BIXEPS comes in.
In a community study published in Aging in 2023 (Venugobal et al.), 101 participants in Singapore aged 38 to 91 underwent 10 minutes of weekly BIXEPS therapy.
Over 8 to 12 weeks, participants saw mean reductions of about 3.7% in visceral fat and 3.9% in total fat, with the largest reductions in older participants.
Supporting this, a 2025 mouse study (Wong et al.) found that even the gut-bacteria profile of magnetically treated animals, when transplanted into others, raised fat oxidation and mitochondrial activity.
2. Seniors
Most of my clients are seniors, and their common goal is to stay strong, mobile, and independent for as long as possible.
Aptly, this is where BIXEPS has its most direct human evidence.
Pain Perception and Mobility
For instance, here are the findings in the aforementioned Singapore community study in Aging (Venugobal et al., 2023):
The vast majority of participants completed all 12 sessions, and improvements were seen across all three functional mobility tests, with the greatest gains in older and more frail participants.
Mean Timed Up and Go improved from 11.25 to 9.31 seconds (oldest group, 76–91 years: 15.35 to 13.14 seconds)
Pain perception improved significantly, including for those with severe chronic pain
Osteoarthritis
BIXEPS is also relevant to knee osteoarthritis, which is common among seniors.
Two trials using the BIXEPS device address it directly.
Firstly, in an end-stage knee OA randomised controlled trial (Wang et al., 2024), BIXEPS combined with home-based exercise significantly improved knee muscle strength compared with exercise alone.
In particular, the greatest muscle strength benefit was observed among female patients over 70.
Separately, a double-blind, placebo-controlled trial in milder knee OA (Lau et al., 2026), which also used BIXEPS, replicated the muscle-strength gain.
3. Runners
The last group of clients I often recommend BIXEPS to are runners.
This is because BIXEPS targets muscle mitochondria and recovery — the same systems that endurance training taxes.
It is therefore plausibly useful for the running population, and there are two relevant BIXEPS studies.
Achilles Tendinopathy
65 patients underwent 12 weeks of eccentric calf-strengthening — the standard, evidence-based treatment — and one group additionally received biweekly 10-minute BIXEPS sessions for the first 8 weeks in a randomised controlled trial of BIXEPS for the condition (Ko et al., 2024).
For the main outcome, both groups improved substantially and almost equally: pain and tendon scores fell across the board, and adding BIXEPS did not outperform eccentric exercise alone.
However, Achilles tendinopathy comes in two forms: midportion — the thickened, painful stretch a few centimetres above the heel — and insertional, right where the tendon anchors to the heel bone.
The midportion is by far the more common type and the classic overuse injury in runners.
And in that midportion subgroup, the BIXEPS group came out ahead of sham at 12 weeks: less sport-related pain, lower ‘worst’ pain, and more time back on their feet doing sport.
General Recovery From Injury and Surgery
A Southeast Asian randomised-controlled pilot trial (Stephenson et al., 2022) found that magnetic field therapy applied to the thigh after ACL reconstruction improved muscle mitochondrial bioenergetics and lowered systemic ceramide levels — treating rehabilitation as a whole-body metabolic event, not just a localised knee fix.
Upcoming Studies
My team has previously conducted pilots to assess the device’s effectiveness and found increases in VO2 max in a small participant pool (n=8) after 8 weeks of BIXEPS use.
There has also been anecdotal evidence that BIXEPS may improve resting lactate and anaerobic threshold levels, although more research, such as the ongoing study at Singapore Sports, is needed to confirm these findings.
Conclusion
My take is that there is early evidence that BIXEPS is useful for certain populations.
However, more research is needed for it to be included in standard clinical and high-performance protocols.
It is worth noting that the company has obtained FDA and HSA clearance for BIXEPS models under different device names.
Perhaps most importantly, it provides a valuable option to many of my clients who are looking for results beyond what exercise can typically deliver, e.g. mobility-impaired seniors, the oldest old, time-crunched individuals, etc.
If you would like to learn more, please get in touch.
References
Begum, S. (2023, November 20). Magnetic pulse therapy strengthens muscles and prevents frailty, especially for elderly. The Straits Times.
Deurenberg-Yap, M., Schmidt, G., van Staveren, W. A., & Deurenberg, P. (2000). The paradox of low body mass index and high body fat percentage among Chinese, Malays and Indians in Singapore. International Journal of Obesity and Related Metabolic Disorders, 24(8), 1011–1017. https://doi.org/10.1038/sj.ijo.0801353
Ko, V. M.-C., Chen, S.-C., He, X., Fu, S.-C., Franco-Obregón, A., Yung, P. S.-H., & Ling, S. K.-K. (2024). Short-term effects of pulsed electromagnetic field therapy for Achilles tendinopathy: A randomized controlled trial. Orthopaedic Journal of Sports Medicine, 12(11). https://doi.org/10.1177/23259671241284772
Lau, K. K. L., Chen, A. S. C., Fu, C. H. Y., Ng, J. P., Ong, M. T. Y., Yung, P. S. H., & Lui, P. P. Y. (2026). Pulsed electromagnetic field therapy for mild-to-moderate knee osteoarthritis: A double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled clinical trial. Journal of Cachexia, Sarcopenia and Muscle, 17(1), e70199. https://doi.org/10.1002/jcsm.70199
Stephenson, M. C., Krishna, L., Pannir Selvan, R. M., Tai, Y. K., Kit Wong, C. J., Yin, J. N., Toh, S. J., … Franco-Obregón, A. (2022). Magnetic field therapy enhances muscle mitochondrial bioenergetics and attenuates systemic ceramide levels following ACL reconstruction: Southeast Asian randomized-controlled pilot trial. Journal of Orthopaedic Translation, 35, 99–112. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jot.2022.09.011
Tseng, F. S., Lim, G. H., Bee, Y. M., Lee, P. C., Tai, Y. K., Franco-Obregón, A., & Tan, H. C. (2025). Investigating the metabolic benefits of magnetic mitohormesis in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus. Journal of Clinical Medicine, 14(18), 6413. https://doi.org/10.3390/jcm14186413
Venugobal, S., Tai, Y. K., Goh, J., Teh, S., Wong, C., Goh, I., Maier, A. B., Kennedy, B. K., & Franco-Obregón, A. (2023). Brief, weekly magnetic muscle therapy improves mobility and lean body mass in older adults: A Southeast Asia community case study. Aging, 15(6), 1768–1790. https://doi.org/10.18632/aging.204597
Wang, Q.-W., Ong, M. T.-Y., Man, G. C.-W., Franco-Obregón, A., Choi, B. C.-Y., Lui, P. P.-Y., Fong, D. T. P., Qiu, J.-H., He, X., Ng, J. P., & Yung, P. S.-H. (2024). The effects of pulsed electromagnetic field therapy on muscle strength and pain in patients with end-stage knee osteoarthritis: A randomized controlled trial. Frontiers in Medicine, 11, 1435277. https://doi.org/10.3389/fmed.2024.1435277
Wong, J. K. C., Patel, B. K., Tai, Y. K., Tan, T. Z., Khine, W. W. T., Chen, W. C., Kukumberg, M., Ching, J., Lee, L. S., Chua, K. V., … Franco-Obregón, A. (2025). Fecal microbiota transplantation from mice receiving magnetic mitohormesis treatment reverses high-fat diet-induced metabolic and osteogenic dysfunction. International Journal of Molecular Sciences, 26(12), 5450. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijms26125450
Yuen, S.-Y. (2020, November 29). Protein activated by magnetic field-generating device can strengthen muscles without exercise. The Straits Times.