Definition of "diathermy" [diathermy]

• The therapeutic generation of local heat in body tissues by high-frequency electromagnetic currents. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "I should also point out, as Shebardigan mentioned in an earlier post, microwave ovens and diathermy essentially heat by coupling energy from an RF field to the vibrational and rotational modes of molecules, especially complex organic molecules."
• "The fact that the effect observed RF burns on human skin happens over a small area, and is accompanied by other phenomena that one might not notice until the second or third such incident is strongly indicative of resistive heating, and deprecatory of a diathermy hypothesis. stevaroni replied to comment from Shebardigan"
• "That would be diathermy as opposed to simple heat generated at the point of skin contact by the passage of current through a fairly large-value resistor."