Hi Anne
December is another great issue, but one of the letters on the Dear Anne page has me worried. While the idea of using magnets as closures for cardigans is great, if you have a pacemaker it could seriously interfere with the heart rhythm. Before 2000, I was working for a GP and at one of our Christmas parties I wore a little Christmas tree brooch with lights powered by a battery. I thought I looked very festive but the doctor and his wife, who was a nurse, were very concerned. They asked me to remove the brooch – not just switch it off, remove it. The doctor then gave me a really good reason why I needed to remove it. It was fairly close to my heart and it seems it could affect my very healthy heart rate. Needless to say I took it off straight away. Neodymium magnets are very strong. I have a craft stamping platform which uses two to keep the card in place while stamping. I accidentally put them close together with a bit of skin in between. A huge ouch! They’re strong and very difficult to pull apart. If you use them instead of buttons on a cardigan please, please be careful where you put them and here’s an article you might like to read for the full story.
Magnetic Jewelry May Have Fatal Attraction
Best wishes, Katy
Karin spotted this and wrote to say:
Hi Anne
Yes, the usual safeguards for magnets apply. They come with a warning about such things as pacemakers and other electronic devices. Like all magnets, don’t put them near magnetic data carriers such as credit cards or they might wreck havoc with the stored data! The magnets need to be pretty strong so they can work through two layers of knitting and still be quite small. But since they are coated in plastic, at least it’s difficult to put a bit of skin between them. Without that plastic cover, it would be very hard to pull them apart by hand when joined, as they really are strong. Since no one near me has a pacemaker, I didn’t think about it much. But to your readers it might be highly important, so please give my thanks to Katy for reminding us. Best wishes, Karin
