John Porcari, a professor of exercise and sports science at the University of
Wisconsin, tested an EMS device similar to those on the market in a study
commissioned by the American Council on Exercise. After eight weeks of using the
device only, participants had no significant increases in muscle size or strength.

"I think people are wasting their time," Porcari said. "I think they're better off spending
their money on a personal trainer or buying a membership to a health club, or buying
a home piece of exercise equipment that they're going to use."

AbTronic declined any comment under advice of their attorney. Ab-Energizer also
declined comment, and Fast-Abs did not return phone calls or e-mails sent by Good
Morning America.

Want Flat Abs? Order Now

The Fast-Abs ad claims the technology makes it easy: "It's like our engineer shrunk
half a gym of bulky, expensive exercise equipment into a little electronic miracle the
size of a pack of matches."

Victoria Delaney, a San Francisco Bay area woman who saw the AbTronic
infomerical, was intrigued by the thought of achieving amazing abs just like the young
woman in the commercial.

"That's what I thought I was going to get," Delaney told Hunter, pointing to the buff
young woman's flat stomach. After seeing the ad, she immediately reached for her
telephone and credit card and ordered an AbTronic.

Delaney thought the device would let her get trim while sitting around and reading a
book or watching TV.

"Sure, I thought it would be easy," Delaney said.

Company Warns of Skin Burning Reports

Delaney said she used her AbTronic religiously for three days, but then she said she
had to stop because it gave her a number of minor but painful burns on her arms,
stomach, both legs and her back, making it difficult to sit.

When she looked at the instruction booklet later, Delaney discovered that the
company warned that "skin irritation and burns ... have been reported."

Though Delaney does not have any permanent injuries, her pride is a little scarred,
and she feels naïve for being taken, she said.

But it is easy to see why people like Delaney might be drawn to the devices. Not only
does the AbTronic infomercial show seemingly perfect men and women using it, the
commercials claim that a University of Maryland study backs up products like theirs.

"Their conclusion was that an electronic stimulation was much better than exercise
alone, whether you use it as a supplement to your normal workout, or just by itself," a
female co-host of the infomercial says. "That proves that you get better results by the
use of the AbTronic fitness system," the male co-host chimes in.

Machine Can't Do It Alone

The University of Maryland scientist who conducted the study, Dr. Gad Alon, published
an article about electronic muscle stimulation in 1987. He said that he believes
high-quality EMS devices can strengthen the abdominal muscles, but that the
AbTronic infomercial took his findings out of context.

"In fact, we have used electrical stimulation on abdominal strengthening in a number
of studies," he said. "And that particular one [AbTronic] does not look at all like the type
of strengthening we do with electrical stimulation."

Porcari acknowledges that medically approved EMS devices can play a useful role in
rehabilitative medicine. But he says consumers can't comfortably get strong enough
contractions from these infomerical devices to build "awesome abs" without real
exercise.

"To get the benefits, you have to make your muscles contract to a certain level, and
that requires you to be able to withstand a lot of pain," he said.

Dr. Julio Garcia, a Las Vegas plastic surgeon, appeared in the AbTronic infomercial
touting the device.

"The nice thing about the AbTronic system is you don't have to go to a gymnasium,
where you have to do weight-lifting exercises, where we may have some other
medical problems that prevent from doing that - whether it's high blood pressure or
bad joints," Garcia says in the infomercial.

Garcia told Hunter that although EMS. can help maintain muscle tone, it will not help
people lose weight. He also said that the AbTronic commercial took some of his
words out of context, and that the machine alone cannot help a person lose weight,
lose inches and gain muscle definition.

"It was my intent to talk about many things together - diet, exercise, and the
machine," Garcia said. "It has apparently been portrayed as just a machine itself. And
that's not what I was there to talk about."

Delaney says she spent $150 on the AbTronic, and chalks it up to one of life's
lessons that she hopes others can learn from. Her advice to anyone lured by the ab
machine commercials is simple

"Don't buy it," she said.