Comment by cue_the_strings
8 hours ago
All of these studies are always performed by Finns (or SE / DK / NO + maybe Russia).
I'd love to see this (and other sauna studies) replicated by someone somewhere to the south or hotter climates in general (southern Europe, Africa, hotter parts of Asia and the Americas).
I doubt they would replicate it or any of the magical effects of saunas. Lots of the sauna studies suffer from the same issue where people self-report sauna usage rather than being assigned randomly to a treatment group. In countries where saunas are readily accessible and most people are under the impression that the more you use sauna the healthier you are, the ones that use the sauna less are probably because they tolerate it far worse. And that's probably related with age, comorbidities, physical condition, etc.
Basically, the sauna studies are probably mostly discovering that "healthier people can stand sauna longer". In countries where most people don't stand sauna for more than a few minutes, that self-selection bias won't exist.
Also location. In my country, saunas at home aren't as common in Finland, but basically every gym has one. So the people that use the sauna the most, are likely to be the most active.
I don't know about that. As in yes I agree but that seems to apply to Western countries in general. For example in Tunisia, people go to public baths at least once a week and part of that involves sitting in a hot steamy room for 30+ minutes. So here you have an example for a population that does use sauna (in a way) but aren't relying on self-reporting.
There’s a saying in Finland that foreign "saunas" are not true saunas at all, but rather just "untypically warm rooms".
The experiments where at 73°C which is a lot hotter than most gym/hotel/spa saunas I’ve been in outside Finland
As an Estonian, anything below 80°C is considered a "kids sauna". 80°C - 90°C is a cold-but-workable sauna and proper sauna starts from 90+°C. I'd assume it's the same in Finland as we share a lot of the sauna culture.
This would be same in Germany and eastern european countries too. But it really depend on humidity. High humidity saunas don't have to be hot and get tough pretty quicky. 100c dry sauna is lot more manageable than 60c humid sauna (atleast to me).
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90+ sauna sounds painful. Are you actually throwing water? Because even with 80 the steam is pretty hot
Also while 73°C is a proper sauna, there are plenty of hotter ones. 90°C is closer to what I'm used to at my apartment building's common sauna. I do take two breaks when I'm there for 30 mims though.
What percent humidity? That is just as important as temperature for understanding how tolerable a particular sauna is.
73° hot?
Here in mainland Europe, a "classic fin sauna" is usually at least 90°++
Would those be "dry saunas" or proper ones where you're allowed to throw water on the rocks? Adding humidity ('löyly') is kinda the point, and 73°C might be just fine for a small sauna, giving you a nice punchy löyly.
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Anything beyond 90 C is not a sauna :) Better to have 90+ and hot steam as in Russian sauna (banya) :)
you can sous vide beef and pork at a lower temperature than that
I knew a guy that would bring a steak sealed in a vac seal bag to the gym and leave it in the sauna while he worked out. One hour later he was done working out and it was ready to eat too. Not sure I can actually recommend it to others but the novelty was interesting till they nearly kicked him out of the gym.
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And also replicated with participants not used to high temperatures inside a typical Finnish sauna. As the study said such people are very difficult to find in Finland. But I wonder if a person who has never been to a real sauna would tolerate this study protocol (2*15 min at 73° Celsius) without any training.
Sauna and hot climates may sound counterintuitive, but it has been tested by most Finns that when you come out of a hot sauna any outside temperature feels cool.
I'm an immigrant in Scandinavia, originally from a hot country, in my experience a 73C steam sauna is quite tolerable for a 2*15 min session.
The first time I was in a sauna after moving was a bit harder than after getting used to it but doable.
Nowadays I just love them, my friends and I built a couple of saunas to leave by the lake in their summerhouses, the cravings of going from hot -> very cold, and back to the heat is hard to explain, and I totally recommend it.
Ever heard of hamam?
Hammam is not as hot as sauna and not as dry. Sauna's air temperatures can reach above 100 degress Celsius and humidity is usually relatively low (around 20%).
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sauna
Hammam's temperatures are around 40-50 degrees Celsius and humidity is close to 100%.
These are very different conditions, with very different body response.
> Hammam's temperatures are around 40-50 degrees Celsius and humidity is close to 100%.
Which makes it absolutely unbearable. By the way, that combination of temperature + humidity will cause severe hyperthermia (which can be deadly) faster than people think.
There is also a World Championship with up to 130°
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Sauna_Championships
:-D
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I have not, what is it?
A steam sauna originating in Turkey, popular in many Arabic countries.
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It is hard to study this in a place with less access to saunas.
Saunas are very cheap to buy and/or build, certainly within the budget of an average research grant.