Cryotherapy is done by exposing your body to extreme cold for medical benefits.

The popular whole-body cryotherapy method has you stand in a chamber that covers all parts of your body except your head. The air in the chamber goes down to temperatures as low as negative 200°F to 300°F for up to 5 minutes.

Cryotherapy has become popular because of its ability to treat painful and chronic conditions like migraine and rheumatoid arthritis. And it’s also been thought to be a possible weight loss treatment.

But does cryotherapy for weight loss really have any science behind it? The short answer is probably not.

Let’s discuss the purported benefits of cryotherapy for weight loss, whether you can expect any side effects, and how it stacks up against凉爽.

The theory behind cryotherapy is that it freezes fat cells throughout the body and kills them off. This causes them to be filtered out of the body by your liver and permanently removed from areas of fat tissue.

A2013 study在《临床研究杂志》中发现，每天暴露于62.5°F或17°C）每天在6周内每天2小时降低总体脂肪约2％。

This is because a substance in your body called brown adipose tissue (BAT) burns fat to help make energy when your body is exposed to extreme cold.

这表明人体可能具有降低寒冷温度引起的脂肪的机制。

A 2014 study in Diabetes exposed participants to increasingly cold temperatures and then increasingly warmer temperatures every night for 4 months. The study started at 75°F (23.9°C) down to 66.2°F (19°C) and back up to 81°F (27.2°C) by the end of the 4-month period.

研究人员发现，暴露于逐渐冷却的温度会使您的蝙蝠对这些温度变化的反应更快，并帮助您的身体在加工葡萄糖方面变得更好。

This isn’t necessarily linked to weight loss. But increased sugar metabolism can help you lose weight over time by helping your body better digest sugars that can otherwise turn into body fat.

Other research also supports the idea that cryotherapy works best when it’s combined with other strategies for weight loss — like exercise.

A2014 study在氧化医学和细胞寿命中，在波兰国家队的16名皮划艇运动员以-184°F（-120°C）进行全身冷冻疗法，至-229°F（-145°C），每天约3分钟10天。

Researchers found that cryotherapy helped the body recover more quickly from exercise and reduce the effects of reactive oxygen species (ROS) that can cause inflammation and weight gain over time.

This means that cryotherapy can allow you to exercise more often due to a faster recovery time and experience fewer negative effects of压力和体重增加.

And here are some other recent highlights from research on cryotherapy for weight loss:

  • A2016 studyin the British Journal of Sports Medicine found that 3 minutes of exposure to temperatures of −166°F (−110°C) 10 times in a 5-day period had no statistically significant effect on weight loss in men.
  • A2018 studyin the Journal of Obesity found that long-term cryotherapy activates a process in the body called cold-induced thermogenesis. This led to an overall loss of body mass particularly around the waist by an average of 3 percent.

Cryotherapy has been found to have some side effects that you may want to consider before you attempt to try it for weight loss.

神经副作用

Extreme cold on the skin can lead to a number of nerve-related side effects, including:

  • numbness
  • tingling sensation
  • redness
  • skin irritation

这些通常是临时的，在手术后仅持续几个小时。如果他们在24小时后没有离开，请去看医生。

长期使用

没有比医生建议的冷冻疗法时间更长，因为长期的冷暴露会导致永久性神经损伤或皮肤组织死亡（坏死）。

Whole-body cryotherapy done at below-freezing temperatures should never be done for more than 5 minutes at a time, and should be supervised by a trained provider.

If you’re trying cryotherapy at home with an ice pack or a tub filled with ice, cover the ice pack with a towel to avoid freezer burns. And don’t do an ice bath for longer than 20 minutes.

Diabetes complications

Don’t do cryotherapy if you havediabetes或类似的条件,损害了你的神经. You may not be able to feel the cold on your skin, which can lead to more nerve damage and tissue death.

凉爽works by using a method called cryolipolysis — basically, by freezing fat off.

凉爽is done by inserting a small section of your body fat into an electronic tool that applies extremely cold temperatures to that section of fat to kill the fat cells.

A single CoolSculpting treatment takes about an hour for a section of fat. Over time, the fat layer and “cellulite” that you can see under your skin are reduced. This is because the frozen fat cells are killed and then filtered out of your body through your liver a few weeks after you start treatment.

凉爽is still a relatively new procedure. But a 2014 review of research 发现冻约液可以在治疗后降低处理区域的脂肪量多达25％。

凉爽works best when it’s combined with another weight loss strategy, such as portion control or exercise. But when done regularly alongside these lifestyle changes, CoolSculpting can permanently remove areas of fat on your body.

Cryotherapy has been linked to some health benefits, but few of them are related to weight loss. The possible side effects of cryotherapy may outweigh the largely unproven benefits of weight loss.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has also warned of the lack of evidence for this procedure and possible complications that can arise.

在决定尝试冷冻疗法或相关治疗（例如CoolSculpting）之前，请与医生交谈。它可能是昂贵且耗时的，如果您的饮食和生活方式改变将帮助您更有效地减轻体重，则可能不值得。