Practicing family physicians from the UNC Department of Family Medicine have teamed up with The Carrboro Citizen to bring you a weekly feature responding to your questions about health and medicine. Send your questions or comments to yourhealth@unc.edu
This week we respond to questions about saunas and drinking alcohol in pregnancy.
Dear HOUSE Calls, I love to go to hot springs and saunas. Is there any health benefit?
Inasmuch as health is about how you feel, and enjoying a sauna makes you feel better, then i guess it is good for your health. This may be because you almost have to relax in a hot tub (since it’s hard to check emails or answer the phone). We also know that hot tubs can help with some forms of chronic pain like arthritis and fibromyalgia. If you are referring to the widely reported healing benefits of hot springs and mineral springs, we know of no research to support those claims – but if it feels good, there is not much downside. There are some risks associated with hot tubs, and those should
be heeded. take care not to get dehydrated and follow suggested time limits (usually 10 minutes). Also avoid alcohol in the hot tub; it can impair judgment and contribute to dehydration.
Dear HOUSE Calls, I am eight weeks pregnant and wonder if you think an occasional glass of wine is OK. I’ve heard that alcohol in small quantities may be safe.
That is a great question, and one many of our patients ask during prenatal care. The major issue is fetal alcohol syndrome, which is generally associated with large quantities of alcohol. However, we know that alcohol is toxic to the developing brain, and we don’t know of a level that is known to be safe. on the other hand, we don’t know of harm associated with low-level consumption. Most doctors will advise you to avoid alcohol during pregnancy. Let’s think of it this way: We like to avoid drugs and other potential toxins during pregnancy – even drugs that are probably safe. With alcohol, we have a known toxin. If it is not important for the health of the woman or the fetus, why expose the fetus to the risk of a known toxin? We also suspect that the level of exposure is related to the fetal effects. It might be hard to measure if small amounts of alcohol were associated with mild changes to behavior, development and intelligence later in life. So we think it is safest to avoid alcohol.
House Calls is a weekly column by Dr. Adam Goldstein, Dr. Cristy Page and Dr. Adam Zolotor on behalf of Your Health and the UNC Department of Family Medicine.