Curious to know if the hype is all it is cracked up to be? Below we are weighing in on the trending topics…

Cold Baths, Ice Baths, Saunas, Sauna Blankets, Heated Exercise Cryotherapy are just a few of the extremely popular methods for cold/heat exposure. Understanding why exposing ourselves in uncomfortable temperatures is so important and their benefits, should get you thinking about booking an appointment at the spa or possibly purchasing something for your home.

“Deliberate heat exposure is a powerful tool to improve health and longevity “Andrew Huberman, PHD, Professor of neurobiology and ophthalmology at Sandford School of Medicine)

Our bodies heat up from the outside in or inside out. The brain is constantly sending signals to our body’s heating and cooling system based on the environment around us. If we get into a cold shower, our brain automatically thinks we need to heat up and therefore raise our body temperature on the inside. On the contrary, on a hot summer’s day, our brain will send signals to our body to cool down.

Let’s focus on heat first and the most widely known method….THE SAUNA

Regular use of sauna and heat exposure as been shown to reduce mortality by cardiovascular events, stroke and all-cause mortality. The recommended temperature would be between the 80C- 100C or 176F-212F. Research suggests that staying in that type of heat from anywhere between 5-20 minutes a session, 2-7x per week. Or a total of 50-57 minutes per week.

A few reasons why heat is beneficial for our health

1. ‍Blood flow and Injury Recovery - Applying heat and/or being immersed in heat helps relieve muscle pain along with opening up veins for efficient blood flow. It is truly one of the most effective ways of increasing and accelerating healing from injuries, joint and muscle stiffness, inflammation etc.‍
2. Detoxification and Inflammation - Sweating facilitates a much higher excretion of some heavy metals including aluminum, cadmium, cobalt and lead compared to our other ways of detoxing through urine. Sauna use also increases interleukin-6 (IL-6) and Interleukin-10 (IL-10) which are anti-inflammatory modulators. Inflammation is the start and center of all disease. Maintaining a balance of pro and anti-inflammatory factors is difficult with all the stressors in our environment (food, lifestyle, environment, toxins etc). So, it is important that our IL-6 and IL-10 are at a sufficient level to decrease inflammation in our body.‍
3. Physiological response to heat stress - Exposure to high temperature stresses the body. It stresses the heart by increasing the heart rate by 60-70%, it redistributes the body’s circulation from the core to the skin to facilitate sweating and driving fluid losses. Repeated heat exposure use acclimates the body to heat and optimizes the body’s response to future exposure known as hormesis. It basically alleviates stressors to the magnitude of life stressors. Therefore, we become better at dealing with stressors because our body gets “used” to this type of stress.

If you are interested at all in purchasing an at home portable sauna - we highly recommend Therasage - the experts in Infrared Healing. For extra savings use code VAGUSCLINIC

Please always check with your Health Coach, Functional Medicine Practitioner or Doctor to ensure that these techniques are right for you.

Check out the next post about COLD Treatments.

If you ever have any questions - please feel free to email us at info@vagusclinic.com and one of our Client Care Coordinators would be happy to answer your questions and point you in the right direction to help get you started on your personal health journey!

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