STUDY ANALYSIS: Baths Better than Saunas?

Could the benefits of saunas be overhyped? A new study says yes

A new study claims that hot baths provide measurably better health benefits than either traditional or infrared saunas.

According to the new research, immersion in a hot bath leader to greater increases in core body temperature, heart rate and cardiac output, and a greater decrease in blood pressure, than either kind of sauna, and closely mimicked the effects of moderate-intensity exercise. Unlike sauna use, having a hot bath also stimulated the immune system, causing spikes in interleukin-6, natural killer cells and cytotoxic T-cells that lasted for up to 48 hours.

The study clearly suggests the benefits of expensive sauna treatments may overhyped, and that the key to achieving maximum benefits from heat treatment is even, sustained exposure, which full-body immersion in water provides best.

The researchers, from the University of Oregon, took 20 healthy young adults—male and female, average age 24–and put them through three separate heating sessions, with one week between each.

The experiment was designed to mimic how people actually use heat treatments in real life, rather than ideal laboratory conditions.

For the hot bath, participants were immersed up to their sternum in water at 104.9 deg. F for 45 minutes. In the traditional-sauna session, they did three ten-minute rounds at 176 deg. F. The infrared-sauna session involved sitting for 45 minutes at a temperature that gradually increased from 115 deg. F to 149 deg. F.

Core body temperature was measured every five minutes, and heart function was measured before, during and after each session. Blood samples were taken before and then directly after each session, followed by two more samples 24 and 48 hours later.