Sauna and Health: What Regular Sauna Bathing Gives You

A sauna is not a therapy, and nobody should sell it as one. It is a ritual that works noticeably when done regularly. Here are the effects people talk about most, and the limits people talk about least. This is general information, not medical advice.

Circulation and recovery

The heat widens the blood vessels and the pulse rises, similar to moderate exercise. For a healthy body that is a stimulus; for one with existing problems it may not be.

Afterwards the muscles relax noticeably, the most immediate effect and the reason the sauna is so popular after sport.

The relaxation comes mainly in the breaks between rounds. If you shorten the breaks, you give the effect away.

Sleep

The effect users notice most often and fastest.

Falling asleep goes together with a falling body temperature. The sauna raises it, and the cooling afterwards lowers it clearly, which the body reads as a signal to sleep.

Best 1.5–2 hours before bedtime. Directly before, it tends to be stimulating.

Switching off

Twenty minutes in the warmth, without a phone, without anyone wanting anything from you. For many people the most valuable part of the ritual.

What the sauna does not do

It does not “detox”. That is the job of the liver and kidneys; sweat is mainly water and salts.

It does not make you slim. The weight loss is water that comes back with the next drink.

It does not cure an infection you already have. On the contrary, it puts additional strain on the body.

When to skip it

With a fever or an infection.

After alcohol. This combination lies behind most serious incidents in saunas.

With fresh injuries with inflammation.

With heart conditions, high blood pressure, diabetes or epilepsy, and in pregnancy, a doctor should decide.

Always: at the first feeling of weakness get out, and drink water before and after.