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Is Cryotherapy an Effective Weight Loss Tool?

Learn How Cryotherapy for Weight Loss Can Help You Achieve and Maintain Your Weight Loss Goals

Looking for a tool to help you meet your weight loss goals? Cryotherapy may be able to help. Cryotherapy uses extreme cold temperatures to help reduce inflammation and ease pain in your body. It can be used locally or full body. Different types of cryo therapies have been effective at treating a variety of ailments. It may also help you lose weight. 

Cryotherapy is the use of cold temperatures to treat diseases or dysfunctions in the body. You may think of cryotherapy as something exotic, but you have probably used it. If you ever put ice on an injury, you were using cryotherapy. 

Whole body cryotherapy builds on that idea but expands it to the entire body. You step into a chamber that is chilled to extreme low temperatures. You can stay up to three minutes in the chamber, which drops your skin temperature by several degrees. However, your core body temperature stays the same. 

The extreme low temperatures can boost your metabolism immediately. Your body burns more calories to keep you warm. It does that by sending blood to your core, which increases your core body heat. That is your metabolic rate. In addition to boosting your metabolism, this rush of oxygenated and heated blood can help your body. You can burn up to 500 to 800 calories in a 3-minute session. 

Of course, a one-time 500 calorie loss is not going to lead to long-term weight loss on its own.  Repeated cryotherapy sessions can be enough to help you achieve weight loss. Generally, a calorie deficit of 500 calories or more is enough to lead to weight loss. So, consistent cryotherapy sessions can help you lose weight, especially if you combine them with a sensible diet and exercise. 

However, the benefits go beyond a temporary boost in your metabolism during the session. Not all body fat is the same. Instead, your body has your regular fat tissues and another tissue known as brown adipose tissue (BAT). BAT is supposed to be metabolically active, helping make energy when you are exposed to extreme cold temperatures. Studies do support the idea that exposure to temperature changes can help make your body better at processing glucose. Processing glucose does not directly lead to weight loss. However, if you process glucose better, it can help stabilize your appetite. It can also reduce the likelihood that your body will store those calories as excess fat. 

In addition, cryotherapy is known to help with recovery. One of the main reasons people cite for not exercising is that they are injured or sore. The longer you have to take to recover, the harder it is to get back into the habit of exercising. So, if cryotherapy can decrease the time between workouts, that will help indirectly boost metabolism. 

Finally, we know that cryotherapy reduces inflammation. While we need more research, we are beginning to understand the role that inflammation plays in health. Inflammation contributes or causes dysfunction throughout the body. It may even make it more difficult for you to lose weight. So, reducing inflammation may be one of the ways that cryotherapy can help you lose weight. 

If someone tells you that cryotherapy is the only thing you need to do to lose weight, they are not being honest. If all you do is cryotherapy sessions, you may not lose weight. Instead, you may just naturally increase your calorie intake to counter your raised metabolism. Instead, you want to combine cryotherapy with the rest of your weight loss program. You should combine it with exercise and a reasonable eating plan. When you do, cryotherapy can enhance the results you will get from your weight loss program. 

Want to find out more? Contact us at Cryolete. We are happy to answer any questions you may have. Even better, schedule an appointment to come in and try us out. Once you see how much better you feel, we think you will fall in love with cryotherapy!

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