Who does not take cold showers after exercise?

Therapy for trauma and recovery

Every time he goes to the gym or plays football, Huy (20 years old) often showers with cold water, whether it’s winter or summer. This young man thinks that people who are hot, sweaty, and bath in cold water are comfortable.

Although this young man’s mother could not help but worry that this job would affect his health, he reasoned that “soccer athletes still have to soak themselves in ice water after every game”.

Illustrations

So is it really safe to take a cold shower after exercising?

Sharing this, Assoc. Dr. BS. Elite physician Vo Tuong Kha, director of the Vietnam Sports Hospital, said that in sports medicine, cold compresses are applied to injury and recovery cases.

Specifically, with acute injury within the first 72 hours, cold compress (soak) is the thermotherapy of physical therapy and rehabilitation.

“This is a content of the PRICE principle (Pressure, Ice, Compression, Elevation). It has analgesic, anti-inflammatory, edema-reducing, and anti-muscle spasm effects that continue when the injury occurs within the first 72 hours. In addition, cold immersion at a temperature of even minus Celsius is also one of many therapies to help restore physical strength after training and competition, especially at sports tournaments where matches take place continuously and thickly. special”, Assoc. Dr. Vo Tuong Kha said.

Who should not apply?

However, according to Prof. Dr. Vo Tuong Kha cryotherapy also has undesirable effects. Specifically, frequent immersion in cold water reduces the ability of muscles to adapt to strength training.

“In some cases, there may be a risk of developing cardiovascular disease or potential high blood pressure, even cardiac arrest or stroke, especially if you soak in the ice bath for too long,” Associate Professor. Dr. Vo Tuong Kha emphasized.

In addition, another situation that may be encountered when using cryotherapy is skin burns (cold burns). Accordingly, the person will experience numbness or tingling, which can cause redness and irritation of the skin, which can cause immediate damage (including frostbite in severe cases).

“Therefore, topical cryotherapy should never be applied for longer than 30 minutes and the integrity of the skin must be monitored throughout the procedure,” emphasized Dr Kha.

For the average person, after exercising, jogging, or doing yoga, they can take a cold shower.

However, Prof. Dr. Vo Tuong Kha emphasized, only cold water baths should be taken when seriously implementing the basic principles. Specifically, the coldness of the water is gradually reduced for beginners, avoiding too deep and sudden temperature drops. The time to soak / apply cold locally does not exceed 30 minutes and for the whole body no more than 3 minutes. At the same time, you must ensure that you do not have an acute cardiovascular or blood pressure disease.

“You can take a cold shower to relax the muscles, so that the muscles are not tense, not tired after exercise. However, this is not the optimal solution and also has unintended effects, especially for people with blood pressure, heart disease…

Depending on your physical condition, level and time of exercising, and the weather, you can choose to take a warm or cold bath after exercising,” said Dr. Kha.

Therefore, the Director of the Sports Hospital recommends that athletes and healthy people, after exercising, wipe their sweat, can take a shower immediately. But for ordinary people or amateur athletes, after wiping sweat, you can shower with warm water (5-10 minutes) – gradually cool (2-3 minutes) – warm (5-10 minutes) alternately. Total time is 20-30 minutes.

In addition, to limit the risks encountered when practicing sports, Assoc. Dr. Doctor Vo Tuong Kha said that each citizen, before deciding to choose a sport to improve health, needs to assess their physical condition, physical strength, and assess their medical condition (with potential medical conditions). , chronic disease or not?).

“At that time, the sports doctor in conjunction with the sports coach will advise the practitioner to choose the right sport, choose the right amount of exercise, the right intensity of exercise and recovery measures after the first session. appropriate way”, Assoc. Dr. Dr. Vo Tuong Kha emphasized.

Accordingly, the physical rehabilitation measures used include sound therapy, heat therapy, phototherapy, hydrotherapy, active rehabilitation by physical movement, stretch therapy, therapy. muscle compression, massage, pharmaceutical therapy (functional foods, oriental medicine used for external inhalation and internal drinking), non-drug methods of oriental medicine (acupuncture, acupressure, yoga, etc.) meditation…).

In addition, relaxation – stress reduction, sleep, adequate rest, reasonable and timely balanced nutrition and drinking water are the main methods to accelerate the recovery of physical strength.

N. Huyen