Is soaking your feet in hot water good for your health? Or is it chronic suicide?

Soaking feet in hot water is a health-preserving concept for many people. The most common saying is that foot soaking can "promote blood circulation and remove blood stasis." Many people like to soak their feet, including myself and my family. Unfortunately, for patients with vascular diseases, foot soaking often leads to worsening or aggravation of the condition, or even disaster. What is going on?

Why is foot soaking so comfortable?

Let’s first talk about the blood vessels in the human lower limbs.

The blood in the arteries starts from the heart and goes down to the legs and feet. It is rich in nutrients and oxygen. Through the capillaries, the blood carries metabolic products (waste) through the venous blood and returns to the heart.

The blood vessels in the legs are distributed like branching trees, covering the muscles and skin.

If the arteries dilate, the flow of nutrient-rich arterial blood increases; if the veins dilate, the venous blood carrying waste will stagnate.

When soaking your feet, the local temperature increases, which can cause arteries to dilate, especially the blood vessels in the skin - the saying "promoting blood circulation and removing blood stasis" roughly comes from this.

In my vascular clinic, I often encounter patients with vascular diseases who suffer from foot soaking.

It’s not the patients and their families’ fault, because patients with lower limb vascular diseases often feel cold in their lower limbs, so they naturally think of soaking their feet in hot water.

So why did the result go against our expectations?

Foot bath

The "disaster" of patients with blood clots

Soaking feet in hot water is harmful to patients with varicose veins and venous thrombosis.

What kind of process is this?

When soaking your feet in hot water, the arteries in your lower limbs dilate, especially as the skin becomes congested, and more arterial blood flows into the lower limbs;

However, the venous return capacity is not thereby increased;

Therefore, hot water foot baths can aggravate blood congestion in patients with venous disease who already have poor reflux or obstruction.

In addition, hot water soaking can also cause capillaries to rupture, forming bleeding spots on the skin;

Over time, pigmentation will form and the color of the calves will turn darker;

Bleeding can be more severe if a person with venous thrombosis is taking anticoagulant medication.

Foot bath

Making arterial occlusion and ischemia worse

Although the symptom of lower limb artery occlusion is lower limb ischemia, unfortunately, soaking feet in hot water cannot dilate occluded blood vessels.

Of course, the dilation of unobstructed arteries only increases the blood flow to normal tissues, while ischemic tissues may become more ischemic due to the "blood stealing" phenomenon. In addition, medical research has concluded that an increase in ambient temperature can increase tissue oxygen consumption and aggravate ischemia.

This is why the following principles are used in the treatment of patients with arterial occlusion:

Instead of choosing vasodilators, anticoagulants or antiplatelet drugs are chosen.

Although the ischemic leg is cold, it is forbidden to use infrared heat therapy which has heating effect.

Diabetic foot is divided into three categories: "neuropathy type", "ischemic type" and "mixed type".

Some patients with neuropathy may experience extreme coldness in their legs and feet and fear of cold. Therefore, a hot water foot bath can easily become a comfortable option. The tragedy is that once neuropathy exists, the patient's sensory feedback mechanism for pain and water temperature fails.

Therefore, patients often keep adding hot water, unaware that they have been severely scalded.

The problems faced by patients with ischemic diabetic foot are similar to those mentioned above for "arterial occlusive disease".

Therefore, if you suffer from lower limb arterial occlusive disease and diabetic foot, soaking your feet in high temperatures can lead to amputation!

Knowing these principles, it is recommended that you check whether you have the above-mentioned vascular diseases before soaking your feet; if not, you can enjoy it with confidence.

There is a saying among the people: Soaking your feet in hot water is better than eating ginseng. Rich people take tonics, while poor people soak their feet. There is scientific basis for this statement.

The best time to soak your feet is 9 pm. Because this is the time when the kidney meridian's qi and blood are relatively weak, soaking your feet at this time will increase your body's heat, and your blood vessels will expand, which is beneficial for activating blood circulation, thereby promoting blood circulation in the body. At the same time, the nerves that have been tense all day and the kidneys that have been tired all day can be completely relaxed and fully regulated by soaking your feet at this time, achieving the best kidney-nourishing effect, and people will feel comfortable as a result.

There is no problem for healthy people to soak their feet or take a hot spring bath, but special groups of people should be careful. For example, patients with heart disease, heart failure, low blood pressure, and people who often feel dizzy should not soak their feet in too hot water or in hot springs for a long time.