Persimmon Frost

I carry around a lot of tension in my back. Some of it is plain old stress, some is due to physical problems, but the net effect is the same: My back hurts! A lot. Most of the discomfort occurs in my lower and mid-back, and that area is where this unit really shines. The rolling massage is a comfortable and comforting experience, the shiatsu massage is firmer and more emphatic. I'd say that the latter would be best for working out the kinks while the former is more relaxing. In tandem, they work well. However the shoulder massage function has so far not proved to be very useful, and in fact my neck and shoulders hurt more after use than before. Possibly this is because the unit seems to be designed for someone with a longer torso than I have. I'll have to work with the unit to see if there isn't some way to fix this.

There are a few ways to adjust the back rollers. You can choose full, upper or lower back positions on both shiatsu and rolling massage settings. Rolling massage allows you to adjust the width of the rollers and shiatsu allows the user to stop the massage in a specific place for a little extra therapy.

The heat feature is a lovely addition, but I wish it could be used without the massage. Since there does seem to be a time limit on each massage session, I don't see any reason why the same couldn't be done for a simple heat treatment. However I've never had a Homedics massage cushion which doesn't limit heat use to a massage session, so I really wasn't surprised.

Overall I like the product and plan to get a lot of use out of it, but I'll need to find another chair on which to use it (my desk chair is not particularly compatible with it, alas) and work with it to find the best sort of session to loosen up my aching muscles.