MadSci Network: Medicine
Query:

Re: Should a person on a really hot day drink hot water or cold water?

Date: Wed Sep 15 14:24:26 1999
Posted By: David Auerbach, M.D., Medicine, York Hospital
Area of science: Medicine
ID: 934236445.Me
Message:

Bill,

>From physiologic point of view there is no question that drinking a cold
liquid will reduce the total body heat, and that drinking a hot beverage
will raise it.  You will cool off somewhat by drinking the cold beverage.
Psychologically the situation may be different.  Just as touching adjacent
metal pipes that are cool and warm will be perceived as touching metal cold
and hot, so might drinking a hot liquid fool the body into thinking it 
feels
cooler.

Similarly, suppose that instead of ingesting the liquid you sprayed it on
your skin surface.  The hot water will cause further dilation of the skin
capillaries and help remove body heat faster while the cold water will 
cause
constriction of these capillaries and cause the body to retain heat.
However, the specific heat of water is such that the cold water is bound to
"absorb" more than enough heat from the skin
surface to cause an overall cooling effect.

Bottom line:  adding heat to a system will raise it's temperature, removing
heat will lower it.  While I have great respect for native medical 
practices
and do not equate a medicine man with a charlatan I am afraid in this case
he is all wet.

Dave



Current Queue | Current Queue for Medicine | Medicine archives

Try the links in the MadSci Library for more information on Medicine.



MadSci Home | Information | Search | Random Knowledge Generator | MadSci Archives | Mad Library | MAD Labs | MAD FAQs | Ask a ? | Join Us! | Help Support MadSci


MadSci Network, webadmin@www.madsci.org
© 1995-1999. All rights reserved.