Healthy living
Body matters
Cool heads dispel heat loss confusion
On cold winter days, we all know that we should go out wearing a hat or a hood, because we lose most of our heat from our heads, don’t we? Actually, according to a new report from US scientists, we don’t know anything of the sort – it’s just a medical myth
The team from the center for health policy at Indiana University in the US have tested the long-held theory and found that we lose no more heat from our heads than any from other part of our body.
It appears that the myth may have originated from an experiment carried out by the American military in the 1950s. A group of volunteers were dressed in Arctic survival suits but without hats and then exposed to very cold conditions. Most of their heat loss was through their heads but only because it was the part left uncovered. Since then US army manuals have advised wearing headgear in the cold because ‘40 to 45 percent of body heat’ is lost from the head.
However writing in the British Medical Journal the US researchers say that this is nonsense – if it were true, they say, then wearing a hat would be as important as wearing trousers. The researchers argue that if the Arctic experiment had been carried out wearing swimming shorts the men would have lost only about 10 percent of their heat from their heads and 90 percent from the rest of their body.
One reason the myth may have stuck around for so long is that the face, head and chest are more sensitive to temperature changes than other parts of the body. We’ve all felt our faces sting when we set out on a freezing winter morning. But in fact we don’t lose more heat from those areas than any others.
Of course this doesn’t mean we can ditch our winter woolly hats – we still lose heat from our heads and as the temperature falls we need to make sure we retain as much warmth in our bodies as we can.
As we get older we can become more vulnerable to hypothermia – this is when our body is unable to maintain normal body temperature and it can be potentially life-threatening. Government advice for seniors staying warm and well this winter is that if the cold hits think about staying indoors and if you really need to go out make sure you wrap up warm.
It’s also important to eat well to keep up energy levels to help stay warm during the winter months. ‘Why not make a big pot of soup with all the left-overs this Christmas?’ says Dr Frankie Phillips, registered dietician and spokesperson for the British Dietetic Association. ‘Eating something hot is a great way to stay warm and get lots of fuel to generate energy. Soup can have a good balance of foods with vegetables, protein and carbohydrates so it’s a winner in the winter months.’
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Information on this site is for interest only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. You should consult your own doctor about any specific health concerns.
