Ft in Scorching Water for Headache: Exploring This Pure Treatment

Clearly, counting on medical recommendation from TikTok isn’t advisable (particularly if it’s not coming from a health care provider or different well being care supplier). Nonetheless, some house cures for migraine really assist (extra on this later). And whereas some folks flip to conventional migraine therapies like drugs, others would possibly favor to have choices—which is why we have additionally written about ice water for migraines, meditations for complications, and eyebrow therapeutic massage for head ache.

So earlier than you low cost the feet-in-heat hack, we requested the consultants if there’s any science to again it up. Learn on to seek out out.

Does dipping your toes in sizzling water assist with migraines?

Hydrotherapy (i.e., utilizing heat or chilly water to deal with well being situations) has been round for eons. “There’s a lengthy historical past of utilizing ice or sizzling baths to assist with migraine,” says Noah Rosen, MD, a neurologist at Northwell Well being. That stated, there’s “little proof to assist it,” Dr. Rosen provides.

The frequent perception, particularly on social media, is that heat water diverts blood move to the toes (i.e., away from the top), and this helps to alleviate head ache. However Dr. Rosen says this rationalization is inaccurate: “The concept that warming the toes attracts blood away from the mind just isn’t appropriate.”

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That’s as a result of it’s primarily based on older theories about migraines, which hypothesized that modifications in blood move to the mind induced migraines. Whereas blood vessels do contract and broaden considerably throughout an assault, it isn’t the trigger, says Anna Tempo, MD, neurologist and assistant professor on the Icahn Faculty of Drugs at Mount Sinai. The principle drivers of migraine assaults are electrical activation within the mind and neuroinflammation, she says.

That stated, how heat water helps migraines continues to be “unknown and unclear,” Dr. Rosen says. He theorizes that it could have one thing to do with the best way sizzling (or chilly) temperatures stimulate nerve cells, particularly peripheral ache and lightweight contact receptors. They might modify ache indicators by some means, “having a secondary impact on the central nervous system,” he says. The impact could also be much like “peripheral electrical stimulating units” that assist cease and stop migraines.

Although we nonetheless don’t know why hydrotherapy helps migraine, some preliminary analysis appears to recommend that it does. “Practically 10 years in the past, there was a small research of hydrotherapy the place contributors had toes and arms in sizzling water (after which an ice therapeutic massage of the top) for 45 days,” Dr. Rosen says. He’s referring to a 2016 research within the Journal of Neurosciences in Rural Observe, which discovered that hydrotherapy decreased the frequency and depth of complications in folks with migraine.

Although promising, take the outcomes with a little bit of warning. The therapy used within the research was fairly rigorous: a far more “intensive expertise then merely dipping toes in sizzling water,” Dr. Rosen says. Plus, it concerned a mix of sizzling and chilly therapies, not simply sizzling water soaks on their very own. All this to say, chances are you’ll not have the identical success if you happen to simply dip your toes in a heat tub (however hey, there’s additionally no hurt in attempting).

How lengthy to soak your toes in sizzling water for a headache

So long as you are taking a couple of precautions, a sizzling foot soak is usually protected for most individuals. “The [main] concern about that is utilizing too sizzling water the place it may well trigger burns,” Dr. Tempo says. (As if head ache wasn’t unhealthy sufficient, you actually don’t wish to add singed pores and skin to your listing of issues.) You may keep away from burns by ensuring the water temperature isn’t too excessive and capping your soak to twenty minutes, Dr. Rosen says.

That stated, some teams could wish to skip the foot soak altogether. “People who find themselves aged or who produce other well being situations (who could also be extra weak to overheating or dehydration) could also be in danger for extra regarding uncomfortable side effects,” Dr. Tempo says.

This consists of folks with coronary heart issues. That’s as a result of sudden or extended immersion in sizzling water can spike your physique temperature, overheat your physique, and tax your coronary heart, in line with the Cleveland Clinic. This may create a domino impact, resulting in a harmful rise (or dip) in blood strain, irregular coronary heart rhythms, or, in extreme circumstances, even coronary heart assault.

“Anybody with a coronary heart situation ought to take into account clearance from their doctor” earlier than attempting this, Dr. Rosen says. In case your physician provides you the “okay,” attempt it out. Simply keep hydrated (hold a bottle of cool water inside attain) and be careful for signs like dizziness, emotions of faintness, or nausea.

Identical goes for anybody with neuropathy (nerve harm) within the toes. If neuropathy has induced numbness in your toes, chances are you’ll not have the ability to precisely really feel how sizzling the water is, placing you at increased threat for burns.

Does soaking your toes in chilly water for migraine assist?

Chilly remedy has lengthy been a standard house treatment for migraine. It is sensible: Ice packs have a numbing impact, to allow them to assist alleviate head ache.

In comparison with sizzling foot soaks, scientists have additionally completed extra research on chilly remedy for migraines. “There is a little more information for ice packs or ice caps in serving to to alleviate ache and cut back irritation when used on the top” or neck, Dr. Tempo says.

Living proof: A July 2013 research within the Hawaii Journal of Drugs and Public Well being² discovered that making use of a frozen neck wrap on the onset of a migraine headache considerably decreased head ache.

That stated, there’s nonetheless “no validated information on ice baths or soaking toes in chilly water to deal with migraine,” Dr. Tempo says. So if you wish to go the chilly remedy route, you’re higher off sticking to the science-backed methods and placing an ice pack in your head or neck.

Different therapies for migraines

Whereas it’s at all times nice to have choices for migraine reduction, sizzling foot soaks could also be hit and miss for migraine assaults. That stated, you would possibly favor therapies which have a confirmed observe file. Fortunately, “there are myriad medical therapies and different nonpharmacologic therapies for migraine which were proven to be useful for stopping and stopping migraine assaults,” Dr. Tempo says.

Have in mind: “What may match for one particular person could not work for one more,” she says. And sometimes it’s not one strategy, however a mix of issues that assist. Because of this, it’s essential to at all times “talk about all choices along with your physician to seek out the one that’s best for you,” Dr. Tempo says.

From house cures to treatment and migraine-specific units, these migraine therapies are tried-and-true, per the Cleveland Clinic and Drs. Tempo and Rosen:

• Over-the-counter, pain-relieving medicines like ibuprofen, aspirin, acetaminophen, naproxen, and caffeine are efficient in case you have gentle to reasonable migraine signs
• Medicines to cease migraines can cease or cut back migraine signs like ache, nausea, gentle sensitivity, and so forth.
• Preventive migraine medicines cut back how typically and the way extreme migraines have an effect on you, although you could have to take them every day
• Medical units like Nerivio, Cefaly, and Relivion, vagal nerve stimulators, and transcranial magnetic stimulators use electrical pulses/stimulation or magnetic fields to assist stop migraine
• Constant sleep—lack of sleep is a recognized migraine set off
• Ice packs, ice hats, or different cooling units may help numb and uninteresting head ache
• Sure nutritional vitamins and dietary supplements like magnesium, riboflavin, coenzyme Q-10, and butterbur could assist stop migraine assaults
• Biofeedback helps you develop an consciousness of rigidity in your physique, so you possibly can cut back it and forestall, lower, or cease a migraine headache
• Rest strategies like yoga may help ease rigidity and stress, which can contribute to migraines
• Acupuncture could assist activate pathways within the mind that may “swap off” ache
• Topical peppermint oil or lavender could cut back migraine depth, frequency, and signs like gentle sensitivity, nausea, and vomiting
• Botulinum toxin sort A injections, AKA Botox, interrupts the ache pathway between the mind and nerves within the spinal wire

When to see a health care provider

Relating to migraines, generally DIY approaches merely don’t lower it. In spite of everything, migraines aren’t simply odd complications—they’ll trigger debilitating head ache that may sideline you for hours (and even days).

You probably have any of the next signs, it’s greatest to let your physician know, per Drs. Tempo and Rosen:

• When headache/migraine interferes along with your day by day life or routine (say, you are feeling too crappy to go to highschool or work)
• In case your headache/migraine doesn’t reply to over-the-counter therapies
• In case your headache/migraine comes with different signs like nausea, imaginative and prescient modifications, or gentle sensitivity

Along with taking a historical past of your signs, your supplier may suggest bloodwork or imaging. These checks will assist them get a fuller image of your downside. “It’s at all times good to know what you’re coping with, and easy methods to deal with it optimally,” Dr. Rosen says.

The underside line

“Sadly, there’s no scientific information to recommend that dipping your toes in sizzling water will assist remedy migraines,” Dr. Tempo says. Nonetheless, she acknowledges that “some folks do discover enchancment in discomfort with warmth (or ice) remedy.”

On the finish of the day, “consider warmth therapies as extra consolation measures,” Dr. Tempo says. “They might make a affected person really feel rather less uncomfortable and maybe extra calm.”

So whereas a sizzling foot soak is unlikely to cease a migraine assault, per the docs, it could be one other great tool in your migraine toolbox. Once more, for most individuals, managing migraine takes a mix of techniques. So long as you will have medical clearance out of your supplier, and also you observe a couple of security precautions, there’s little hurt in giving hydrotherapy a go.