Sauna: a simple longevity tactic with a massive ROI!
“Frequent sauna use is associated with a 40% lower all-cause mortality and a 60% lower risk for Alzheimer's disease.“
Dr Rhonda Patrick, PhD
Sauna is hot topic among our Maka Methods, literally and figuratively…It seems like everyone in the health optimization/biohacking space is going (especially) crazy for sauna these days.
And rightly so: the data are in and they’re stunning.
Sauna has been an important ritual in many cultures around the world for many generations and its popularity is booming, not least because of new data around its health benefits.
The incredible Dr. Rhonda Patrick* has lead the charge among North American scientists obsessing over this topic, and my gateway to a newfound love of sauna too. She has researched the topic oh-so-thoroughly (as she does), and I love her take on it. In fact, this post was inspired by an incredible (and very lengthy) white paper she published recently. Here are some juicy tidbits:
“I think in the next 10 years that sauna bathing will become part of the standard of care for the prevention and treatment for heart disease and a variety of heart conditions. Several studies have shown that frequent sauna bathing (4-7 times per week, 174F for 20 min) is associated with a 50% lower risk for fatal heart disease, 60% lower risk for sudden cardiac death, 51% lower risk for stroke, and 46% lower risk for hypertension. Just a single sauna session has been shown to lower blood pressure, improve heart rate variability, and improve arterial compliance.”
Those are stunning numbers, from a stunning number of experiments, carried out over a long period of time….Solid!
Interestingly, some of the positive benefits of the sauna on heart health may have to do with the fact that similar physiological changes occur during sauna as during physical exercise: 50-70% of your blood flows away from the core to the skin, you start to sweat, your heart rate increases up to 150 bpm and your overall cardiac output (how hard the heart works to respond to the body’s need for oxygen) increases by 60-70%!
And more than that, as you read above, Dr. Patrick goes on to say that frequent sauna use is associated with a 40% lower all-cause mortality and a 60% lower risk for Alzheimer's disease.
Unreal!
These factors make sauna bathing one of my all-time favourite Maka Methods for many clients (for whom it’s not a contraindication) looking to improve their overall health and longevity…not to mention their cardiac health, triglycerides and blood markers.
[Nerdy aside: Some of the longevity benefits may be due to the increased production of “heat shock proteins,” which have been shown to slow and in some cases prevent the progression of neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. They’ve also been shown to slow muscle atrophy (shrinkage) and are associated with longevity in many human studies. These effects have also been conclusively demonstrated in lower organisms, including flies and worms, in which heat stress increased their lifespans by as much as 15 percent!**]
Patrick R, Johnson T. 2021. Sauna use as a lifestyle practice to extend healthspan. Exp Gerontology. 154:111509.
If you want to learn more on the benefits of sauna, or hear Dr Patrick speak passionately on sauna and its physiological benefits, check out this podcast.
Footnotes:
* Dr Rhonda Patrick, PhD (UC Berkeley) is a brilliant scientist and someone who we at Maka Health follow closely. She’s a rigorous researcher and treasure trove of health wisdom. She is also a self-proclaimed “cautious biohacker” - being both a relatively new mother and active research scientist. So, before she adopts a health practice,she exhaustively researches it. Her extensive and amazing library of resources, including podcasts, news articles and primary research, can be found @ www.FoundMyFitness.com
This post was inspired by an incredible (and very lengthy) white paper she published recently. Here are some juicy tidbits:
“I think in the next 10 years that sauna bathing will become part of the standard of care for the prevention and treatment for heart disease and a variety of heart conditions. Several studies have shown that frequent sauna bathing (4-7 times per week, 174F for 20 min) is associated with a 50% lower risk for fatal heart disease, 60% lower risk for sudden cardiac death, 51% lower risk for stroke, and 46% lower risk for hypertension. Just a single sauna session has been shown to lower blood pressure, improve heart rate variability, and improve arterial compliance.”
Those are stunning numbers, from a stunning number of experiments over a long period of time. Solid!
Some of the positive benefits of the sauna on heart health may have to do with similar physiological changes as occur during physical exercise. ie. 50-70% of your blood flows away from the core to the skin, you start to sweat, your heart rate increases up to 150 bpm and your overall cardiac output (how hard the heart works to respond to the body’s need for oxygen) increases by 60-70%!
Woah!
Rhonda goes on to say that frequent sauna use is associated with a 40% lower all-cause mortality and a 60% lower risk for Alzheimer's disease.
Woah woah woah!!
(More incredible numbers, especially in the world of science, where significant changes are often in the range of just a few %!)
Some of the longevity benefits may be due to the increased production of “heat shock proteins,” which been shown to slow and in some cases prevent the progression of neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. They’ve also been shown to slow muscle atrophy (shrinkage) and are associated with human longevity. These effects have also been conclusively demonstrated in lower organisms, including flies and worms -> heat stress increased their lifespans by as much as 15 percent!**
If you want to know more, or witness some sweet, nerdy banter between her and Joe Rogan, check out this podcast (scroll down for topics discussed - sauna talk starts @ 1hr 16min).
Footnotes:
* Dr Rhonda Patrick, PhD (UC Berkeley) is someone I follow rather religiously. She is a rigorous and incredible researcher, whose values and integrity I admire. She is a cautious biohacker - being both a mother and active research scientist - so when she adopts a practice, it seems as though she has literally exhausted the research on it. Her extensive and amazing library of resources, including podcasts, news articles and primary research, can be found @ www.FoundMyFitness.com
** If you know about my research / have had the (mis)fortune of bearing my rants on the wonders of the fruit fly as a genetic model system (in which I was engrossed for about a decade), you’ll know I love such fine examples of evolutionarily conserved mechanisms between lower organisms, like flies and worms, to animals to humans. Where would we be with their invaluable leads??
