Cold Water Therapy

Are you among those who hate to take a bath in the early morning? So, you rather smell like a goat than have a shower? Well.. I have a good news and bad news for you.

The good news is you will save on your water bills. The bad thing is, you will lose money in the long run, because your body is weaker than those who take cold morning showers. This is no longer a secret, but not many people know that you could make your immune system stronger naturally, by using water therapy.

Cold Water Effect

In 1990, the Hannover Medical School decided to test some of Father Kniepp method that he claimed would help prevent infection.

So, 50 medical students volunteered to take part in a 6 month trial. 25 students took 2 to 3 minutes of early morning shower as recommended by the founder of water therapy for about 3 weeks. The water was made increasingly colder everyday. The cold shower was stopped when they actually had a cold and a week after that.

Meanwhile the other half of the volunteers took warm showers throughout the period.

In the first month, there was no noticeable difference between the two groups. In the second and third month students who took cold showers had half the number of colds that the warm shower group had. Those in the cold shower group who had cold said that their cold was in fact shorter and less acute.

Father Kniepp had suggested over 100 years ago that regular cold shower would have a hardening effect and will protect the body against infection and the study proved that Father Kniepp was correct.

Other benefits

A study conducted at The Thrombosis Research Institute at London"s Brompton Hospital found that exposure to cold bath had some dramatic benefits. These include :-

1. A boost to sex hormone production which helps regulate both potency in men and fertility in women.

2. Renewed energy and sufferers from chronic fatigue syndrome were found to improve dramatically.

3. Reduces cases of heart attack and stroke because it improved blood circulation.

4. Increase level of white blood cells.

5. Some volunteers in the study found that their nails became harder and their hair growth improved.