Are the Benefits of Cold Plunges and Cryotherapy Just a Placebo Effect?

There have been five placebo-controlled studies on cold water immersion. What did they find? Aren’t the performance-enhancing effects of placebos amazing? No wonder there is a gazillion-dollar sports supplement market! Seems like you can sell anything as long as someone believes it may help. All it takes is the façade of a pseudo “protein” supplement, and poof! The cold plunge benefits disappear. None of the placebo-controlled studies showed that cold plunges help compared to the silliest of placebos, like fake Kool-Aid-type “recovery drinks” and corn starch pills pawned off as “branched-chain amino acid supplements.” You’d think the cold plunge placebo effect might be more intense, but it didn’t take much to completely erase it. But, cold plunges aren’t only useless for athletes; they appear to be actively harmful, which I cover in the next video, The Negative Effects of Cold Plunges for Building Muscle (https://nutritionfacts.org/video/the-negative-effects-of-cold-plunges-for-building-muscle). If you missed the previous video, check out Best Temperature, Timing, and Duration for Cold Plunges for Athletic Performance Recovery (https://nutritionfacts.org/video/best-temperature-timing-and-duration-for-cold-plunges-for-athletic-performance-recovery). Stay tuned for the rest of the series coming out in a couple months. New subscribers to our e-newsletter always receive a free gift. Get yours here: https://nutritionfacts.org/subscribe/. Have a question about this video? Leave it in the comment section at http://nutritionfacts.org/video/are-the-benefits-of-cold-plunges-and-cryotherapy-just-a-placebo-effect and someone on the NutritionFacts.org team will try to answer it. Want to get a list of links to all the scientific sources used in this video? Click on Sources Cited at https://nutritionfacts.org/video/are-the-benefits-of-cold-plunges-and-cryotherapy-just-a-placebo-effect. You’ll also find a transcript and acknowledgements for the video, my blog and speaking tour schedule, and an easy way to search (by translated language even) through our videos spanning more than 2,000 health topics. Thanks for watching. I hope you’ll join in the evidence-based nutrition revolution! -Michael Greger, MD FACLM Captions for this video are available in several languages; you can find yours in the video settings. View important information about our translated resources: https://nutritionfacts.org/translations-info/ https://NutritionFacts.org • Subscribe: https://nutritionfacts.org/subscribe • Donate: https://nutritionfacts.org/donate • Podcast : https://nutritionfacts.org/audio • Books: https://nutritionfacts.org/books • Shop: https://drgreger.org • Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/NutritionFacts.org • Twitter: https://twitter.com/nutrition_facts • Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nutrition_facts_org