Recently, whole-body cryotherapy (WBC) has become a popular trend with athletes and the general public. In a WBC session, you stand in a specially designed chamber that uses liquid nitrogen to chill the air down to somewhere between -200° and -300°F. The treatment generally lasts for 2 to 4 minutes.
Wondering why cryotherapy has become so popular? Here’s a list of the benefits that have been associated with getting yourself cold.
1. Pain Relief
This isn’t new information – but cold can help reduce pain. It’s why you probably reach for an ice pack when you bump your shin against something in the night.
However, research shows that cryotherapy can actually numb nerve pain and even be used to treat arthritic pain.
2. Post-Workout Recovery
The research is mixed on the effects of whole-body cryotherapy in post-workout recovery, but pro athletes and active celebrities swear by it. LeBron James, Mark Wahlberg and Floyd Mayweather, Jr. are all big fans. Usain Bolt, Steph Curry and even the late great Kobe Bryant add to the list of elite athletes with good things to say about cryotherapy.
3. Skin Health
Looking for an unusual treatment for atopic dermatitis and acne? Cryotherapy might be it. One study found that whole-body cryotherapy can help treat atopic dermatitis, and another study found that in mice, it can treat acne.
4. Reduced Inflammation
Inflammation is one way that our bodies fight infection and disease, but chronic inflammation is linked to health problems like cancer, depression, diabetes and even dementia. Multiple studies have shown that cryotherapy can be used to reduce inflammation.
5. Treating Mood Disorders
Chilling your body in a whole-body cryotherapy chamber can cause a hormonal response. When your body releases hormones like adrenaline, noradrenaline and endorphins, it can have a positive effect on your mood. That’s likely why one study found that whole-body cryotherapy was an effective short-term treatment for both anxiety and depression.
6. Cryosurgery for Tumors
It’s very different from whole-body cryotherapy, but a technique named cryosurgery can be used to treat some types of tumors, like those on the skin, and some internal cancers.
In cryosurgery, the doctor applies extreme cold from liquid nitrogen to the tumor, forming a ball of ice crystals around a probe, and freezing nearby cancer cells.
7. Dementia and Alzheimer’s
Some research has suggested that whole-body cryotherapy could be an effective treatment for dementia or Alzheimer’s. While the research isn’t yet definitive, the theory is that the treatment’s effectiveness is related to cryotherapy’s ability to fight inflammation and oxidative stress responses that are associated with Alzheimer’s.
8. Migraine Headaches
If you’ve ever had a migraine, you may have felt like you’d do just about anything for relief. Next time, you might want to try a really simple form of cryotherapy before taking more drastic measures.
The results of one study point to the fact that putting an ice pack on your neck might significantly reduce pain from a migraine headache, through the mechanism of cooling blood passing through your vessels on the way to your head.
Is it for you?
Whether you’re looking at putting a cold pack on an injury, or trying out whole-body cryotherapy, there’s a whole range of benefits you could experience from cryotherapy. Our advice is to give it a try. Find a whole-body cryotherapy clinic near you and book a session.
If the clinic you find is in the Los Angeles area, it might just be using liquid nitrogen that comes from CalOx.