Do warm drinks heat you up??

[discoveringtheforest]

Ive been debating with some friends recently on the question of " while out in the cold weather do warm drinks help heat your body temp?"

Ive read quite a few articles over time arguing both sides in survival situations,what do you think?

 

[BigShot]

I honestly can't see how they wouldn't.

Put heat in and it will warm your core up to some degree just by its presence while it cools to equalise with your body temp.
Thus saving energy allowing you to stay warmer for longer.

Unless I'm missing something really fundamental...
...I suppose if whatever you drank was calorie negative (cost you more energy to digest and absorb than you got from it) you'd end up worse off in the long run.

I don't see the negative though - though things may be different when someone is hypothermic.

 

[Ogri the trog]

Taking the opposite view first,
Anything you take into your body that is colder than iteslf, has to be warmed to the same temperature, using calories. Also assuming that you are purifying your water by chemical means, you'll be consuming a finite resource and would eventually run out of chemical.
Warm drinks would not need to be heated by the body, but you'll have to invest the calories in harvesting fuel, though this would achieve the purification stage as well as heating the drink. Your fuel, harvested sensibly will be a renewable resource.
One thing that often goes unmentioned is that folk like to warm their hands on the sides of a hot cup - this is not always the best thing to do as your body will then be pumping blood to your cold hands and hence risk cooling the core even further - though this often goes without consequence in our centrally heated world.
Thankfully, I've never been in a "Survival" situation, but if I ever do, I'll do my utmost to create fire and I'll use it in as many ways as I can to keep me alive - one of which is likely to be hot drinks.

It might be that warm drinks don't actually warm you up, but cold drinks will certainly cool you down.

ATB

Ogri the trog

 

[widu13]

Think of it this way- 1st scenario: you are feeling chilled. You drink 0.5l of cold water- do you feel warm? 2nd scenario: you are feeling chilled. You drink 0.5l of any hot drink- do you feel warm?

Since people have ventured anywhere, when cold the advice has always been to warm up have a hot drink. If someone was hypothermic would you get them in a doss bag and then give them a cold drink? I certainly hope not!

 

[durulz]

Logic dictates that they MUST warm you up - for the reasons Ogri gave. However, the debate must be to what extent they warm you up. After all, you can't pour scalding hot water down your throat without doing damage. To drink the liquid it must be at a temperature more or less ambient with your body. Therefore, one may wonder how much warming takes place.
But that misses the point.
And that point is the pschological effect the warm drink has on you. Yes, it may be psychosomatic, but in some circumstances that is just as important. If you think you are warming up then that may lift your spirits and give your confidence a boost and the energy to carry.
But I'm sure we'd all agree that a cold drink is not a good thing.

 

[VirusKiller]

Ironically, if your hot drink is at all diuretic, you'll need to drink water as well.

 

[Bodge]

Drinking a warm drink can only heat you up can't it?
even if it's only from the outside of the cup on your fingers. I think the biggest warming comes from the thought of having a warm drink, phycological warming could have a bigger effect than thermal warming. I have been working on my extension at home through the frost and snow (yes my builder mate is mad ) and a nice hot mug of tea boosts moral if nothing else, hardly extreme survival I know but swmbo wont let me rest till the darn thing is built and liveable.

 

[Shewie]

I know I always look forward to a brew stop on a cold day, and I`d say it usually warms me up unless I`m somewhere fairly exposed and the stop has caused me to get cold. I usually make a hot drink before retiring to the hammock when I`m out, it`s a chance to make a hot water bottle with my Sigg aswell if it`s really cold.

I once heard that drinking hot drinks in hot sunny weather is the best way to keep cool as it makes you perspire and any breeze will cool you the moisture down.

 

[Rebel]

A hot drink when I'm cold always works for me.

 

[Sniper]

A hot drink will help in retaining or raising your core temperature, even 1/2 a degree can make a vast and substantial difference, it also, as someone has already pointed out, has a psychological effect of making us feel better maybe even feeling warmer whether physically or not which can really help with the mental will to carry on, side of things, so good in 2 ways.

 

[PJMCBear]

Hypothermia is the cooling of the bodies core, so anything hot you put in that core has to make a difference.

 

[Limaed]

Guys

Through my involvement in Mountain Rescue I understand that this question has been studied under labatory conditions. From what I can remmember hot drinks have minimal effect on re-warming a hypothermic patient.
Thats not the end of the story though as it is imposible to gauge the physicological effect a hot drink can have on a persons moral whilst they are a difficult situation. Equally a hot sugary drink could provide vitally calouries in an exausted casualty and the fluid itself might help in thining the blood.
An exhaused and dehydrated casualty has little energy left in their system and thier blood has less ability to transport the sugars and oxygen around because as we become dehydrated our blood thickens. This is also the reason we have to drink so much whilst climbing at high altitude.
Therefore the answer for me is no a hot drink dosn't rewarm us but it does help to keep us warm. Ta Ed

 

[Sainty]

This is the advice from the NHS website on how to treat hypothermia. They recommend that you give the patient a warm drink, so I guess that a warm drink will warm you up.

Treating hypothermia

Hypothermia is treated by preserving body heat and preventing any more being lost. If you are treating someone with mild hypothermia at home, or waiting for medical treatment to arrive, follow the advice below.

Things you should do:

move the person indoors, or somewhere warm, as soon as possible, ensure that they change out of any wet clothing, wrap them in blankets, towels, coats - whatever you have - protecting the head and torso as a priority. Your own body heat can help someone with hypothermia - try gently hugging them. Increase activity if possible, but not to the point where sweating occurs, which cools the skin down again. If possible, give the person carbohydrates to eat to provide rapid energy, or fats to provide prolonged fuel to the body,
give them warm drinks, but not alcohol, and once body temperature has increased, be sure to keep the person warm and dry.

Source: NHS Website - Treating Hypothermia

Martin

 

[BigShot]

Limaed
That's an interesting post. I saw some documentaries a while back where they were testing the effects of extreme cold and heat and they were as insightful as they were disturbing and upsetting.
Seeing the way people start to fall apart in those situations was not nice for someone who spends so much time out in the snowy mountains (I used to live in the French Alps and things can get pretty rough there sometimes)

That considered I think the psychological effects of a warm drink could almost be more important than anything else. But the fluid and sugar elements seem really important too.

 

[Ben Trout]

The hypothermia drill I have always been taught and now teach is warm but not hot drinks. Too hot and the body will take action to avoid tissue damage, increasing blood flow to extremities to dump excess heat as quickly as possible. This decreases core temperature further.

A warm drink puts heat energy straight into the bodys core, so raises the casulty's temperature without upsetting the body's reflexes.

In the situation of the original question, so long as it's not too hot, yes a warm drink will give some benefit. I'd agree with what a lot of people have said, the psychological benefit is probably greater than the phyiscal temperature gain.

I'll leave the calorie argument for the biologists and chemists.

Enjoy your hot drinks when you're out and about.