Salt lamps (sometimes referred to as Himalayan salt lamps) are a perfect example of a wellness product with a controversial reputation. While it’s one thing to enjoy a salt lamp’s soft pink glow in your home, believing that they posses healing properties—or taking it a step further and attempting to use it as a treatment for a medical condition—is something else entirely. Here’s what to know about what salt lamps can actually do—versus what medical marketing claims they can do. What does this mean in terms of salt lamps? In short, the main basis of health claims is that the lamp produces negative ions, but at this point, there is no meaningful scientific evidence that negative ions do anything to improve a person’s mental and/or physical health. On top of that, there’s also very little evidence that salt lamps even produce and release these negative ions in the first place. That means that there’s no reason to take any of the purported health benefits of salt lamps—including claims that they clean the air, boost your mood, or improve sleep quality—at all seriously. When it comes to advising patients who ask about salt lamps, Puja Uppal, DO, a board-certified family medicine physician, makes it clear that there is no data to support their various health claims. “I tell patients it’s important to know the root cause of your symptoms,” Dr. Uppal says. “Using a salt lamp is like using a bandage over a cut: The bandage can worsen your initial cut by causing an infection. You keep getting new bandages and waste precious time that may be needed for a timely diagnosis, as in the case of skin cancer.” In other words, if someone is relying on a salt lamp to cure a particular health condition instead of actively seeking research-backed treatment, their condition and/or symptoms could get worse the longer they wait to get the healthcare they need. RELATED: 9 Smart, Surprising, and So-Helpful Ways to Use Salt We know that stress can contribute to a number of negative effects on your body and mind, including but not limited to fatigue, headache, muscle pain or tension, chest pain, mood dips, changes in sex drive, nausea, and sleep and digestive disruption. So everyone should take steps to manage or reduce their stress levels in a way that works for them. One frequently encouraged strategy is to practice relaxation techniques that target the sympathetic nervous system and anxious thought loops, like deep breathing and meditation. While relaxation can help mitigate stress in a general sense, the fact still remains that, at this point, there’s no research-based evidence that the use of salt lamps comes with any direct health benefits. But if sitting in a room with a salt lamp helps you feel more relaxed while you practice yoga or mindfulness exercises, then by all means, bask in that rosy glow.
