Cold or Warm Water. What’s better?

Post date: April 6, 2009 4:49 p.m.

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Is drinking cold water good or bad for you? Does the temperature of the water matter at all? Believe it or not – it does matter.

Cold water is not as good for hydration as room temperature. The theory is that the cold water causes the blood vessels surrounding stomach to shrink, slowing absorption.

One theory, upon which medical researchers have varying opinions regards whether drinking cold water is as good for you as drinking tepid water, particularly when you are exercising. Some doctors suggest that room temperature or body temperature water is better than cold water, because the body has to expend energy to heat cold water to body temperature, resulting in some water loss. On the other hand, some doctors say that after physical exertion, you should drink cold water since it will help cool the body more effectively than room temperature water.

What is clear is most people who drink cold water are likely to consume more of it, since it tends to taste better and is more satisfying. Even if drinking cold water results in marginal water loss, the extra water you will probably drink will help make up for this.

The problem is that as the COLD drinks pass through our system, they solidify the fats from the foods we have just eaten or are eating at present. This makes the body find it harder to digest and disperse the unwanted fats from our body.

However, if we simply swap our cold drinks for a warm drink (warm water/ coffee/tea/herbals) the warm fluids help the fats in our foods to remain fluid and so easing the digestive system and helping the fats pass through our body (and reduce risk of clogged arteries).

If you are attempting to help bring down a fever, or assist someone with sunstroke (animal or person), you should not immerse that person or animal in cold water. Instead you should use lukewarm water, or even slightly warm water. Cold water can provoke chills, which may actually raise body temperature. Though baths can be a helpful way to bring down high fevers, you especially want to avoid allowing someone to shiver or get chilled. If people with fevers drink cold water that is very icy, they may also get chilly, so lukewarm or tepid water may be a better choice.

There are a number of other urban legends associated with the amount of liquids and the type of liquids you consume. For instance people are told that coffee, tea and sodas deplete water from their bodies. Actually, people who routinely drink caffeinated beverages retain about two-thirds of what they drink, and this can be counted as part of daily fluid intake. Another “myth” regarding water is the eight, eight ounce (.24 l) glasses of water are needed daily. While this amount of water, whether you drink cold water or hot, won’t hurt you, daily intake of food usually provides about half the amount of needed fluids. Most people would get by with drinking about 32 ounces (approx. 1 liter) daily.

Also warm/hot water relaxes the body better. Cold water might be more refreshing, but it may disrupt your vocal cords, that’s why singers always drink room temperature water.

The best indicator on whether your body is getting enough water is urine color. If your urine is dark yellow, chances are you’re not getting enough water. If you pass clear to very light colored yellow urine, your fluid intake is adequate. Remember that urine color in the morning will always be a little darker.

BeWellBuzz

Our mission and goal is to provide you with the best, factual natural health information on the internet. Created by Larry Oz, a natural health journalist who seeks to empower people informational tools needed to make educated health decisions. Please spread this article far and wide by sharing it with family and friends. As always, please seek professional advice before implementing any practice.BeWellBuzz.com is brought to you by Halcyon Publishing.

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Comments (26)

Brother Sage
April 16, 2009 at 7:18 pm
ALkaline Watter Matters
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXHGBCA0xl4
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ONYEBUCHI APEH
August 14, 2009 at 9:22 am
FROM MY ONW POINT OF VIEW I THINK WAEM WATER IS BETTER THAN COLD ONE BECAUSE,WARM WATER HELP DISOLVE THE FAT IN INTESTINE THERE BY HELPING IN DIGESTION.HAVING IN MIND THAT ACCUMILATION OF FAT IN THE ARTERIES IS DANGERIOUS TO THE HEALTH, I RECOMEND WARM WATER.
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- michael
  December 25, 2011 at 1:14 pm
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  LOL! This is the most bogus article and comment I’ve read in a long long time.
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- michael
  December 25, 2011 at 1:16 pm
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  So somehow fat you eat enters your arteries. And warm water dissolves this fat. Right, you’re forgetting that your body stays BODY TEMPERATURE regardless of the beverages you drink. What a load of crap from the author, and everyone’s eating it up.
  Helping digestion? Like our own vile stomach acids need the help of… WARM WATER… for digestion. Come on. And since when are fats bad?
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a
December 31, 2009 at 8:54 am
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I would like to see some sort of reference about where the info for this article comes from… i would generally agree with the temperature and so on, but with all the respect towards the author i cannot understand how can a coffenaited drink work as a substitude for water. It sounds unbelievable and i am tempted to say misleading, almost harming without any reference to a study claiming such an extraordinary thing. best regards and good luck to anyone decided to consider a cofee or a coke as part of his daily fluid intake.
It just cannot work.
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kai915
April 3, 2010 at 6:30 am
@ a: i think what the article is trying to point out regarding coffee is that it retains more than deplete water as was the point to falsify the myth. keep in mind that coffee is anti diuretic therefore reducing urine output. i don’t think the article suggests of caffeine to be a good substitute for water although i understand where you are coming from given the statement that “it can be counted as daily fluid intake “
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Miguel
July 18, 2010 at 5:16 am
Thank You for this information, spread out knowledge.
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Xavier
September 1, 2010 at 2:18 am
something interesting on that topic
DRINK WATER THERAPY
It is popular in Japan today to drink water immediately after waking up every morning. Furthermore, scientific tests have proven its value. We publish below a description of use of water for our readers. For old and serious diseases as well as modern illnesses the water treatment had been found successful by a Japanese medical society as a 100% cure for the following diseases:
Headache, body ache, heart system, arthritis, fast heart beat, epilepsy, excess fatness, bronchitis asthma, TB, meningitis, kidney and urine diseases, vomiting, gastritis, diarrhoea, piles, diabetes, constipation, all eye diseases, womb, cancer and menstrual disorders, ear nose and throat diseases.
glass of water
METHOD OF TREATMENT
1. As you wake up in the morning before brushing teeth, drink 4 x 160ml glasses of water
2. Brush and clean the mouth but do not eat or drink anything for 45 minute
3. After 45 minutes you may eat and drink as normal.
4. After 15 minutes of breakfast, lunch and dinner do not eat or drink anything for 2 hours
5. Those who are old or sick and are unable to drink 4 glasses of water at the beginning may commence by taking little water and gradually increase it to 4 glasses per day.
6. The above method of treatment will cure diseases of the sick and others can enjoy a healthy life.
The following list gives the number of days of treatment required to cure/control/reduce main diseases:
1. High Blood Pressure (30 days)
2. Gastric (10 days)
3. Diabetes (30 days)
4. Constipation (10 days)
5. Cancer (180 days)
6. TB (90 days)
7. Arthritis (patients should follow the above treatment only for 3 days in the 1st week, and from 2nd week onwards – daily)
This treatment method has no side effects, however at the commencement of treatment you may have to urinate a few times.
It is better if we continue this and make this procedure as a routine work in our life. Drink Water and Stay healthy and Active.
This makes sense…the Chinese and Japanese drink hot tea with their meals not cold water. Maybe it is time we adopt their drinking habit while eating!!! Nothing to lose, everything to gain…
For those who like to drink cold water, this article is applicable to you. It is nice to have a cup of cold drink after a meal. However, the cold water will solidify the oily stuff that you have just consumed. It will slow down the digestion.
Once this “sludge” reacts with the acid, it will break down and be absorbed by the intestine faster than the solid food. It will line the intestine. Very soon, this will turn into fats and lead to cancer. It is best to drink hot soup or warm water after a meal.
warning
A serious note about heart attacks:
• Women should know that not every heart attack symptom is going to be the left arm hurting,
• Be aware of intense pain in the jaw line.
• You may never have the first chest pain during the course of a heart attack.
• Nausea and intense sweating are also common symptoms.
• 60% of people who have a heart attack while they are asleep do not wake up.
• Pain in the jaw can wake you from a sound sleep. Let’s be careful and be aware. The more we know, the better chance we could survive…
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Cathy
October 14, 2010 at 12:17 pm
I have been under the care of a Bio-Chemist for the past 3 years. He has studied water for 45 years and designed his own water treatment system. He has taught me to never drink any fluids with meals and for at least 1 hour after meals. He says drinking fluids while you eat dilutes saliva and digestive acids and food will not be digested properly. Also, he insists his patients drink 3-4 quarts of room temperature water per day. Coffee/tea/sodas do not count.
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Janet
October 23, 2010 at 2:49 pm
By the way how good is alkaline want for you to drink, and does it have benefits, also what is the best machine to buy?
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Lulu(:
October 25, 2010 at 5:07 pm
I think warm water is healthier it BURNS OFF FAT AND HELPS THE DIGESTION!!
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RN
October 27, 2010 at 11:42 pm
I had a friend that mentioned she heard about cold water thwarting weight loss, and after explaining some simple anatomy and physiology to her, I decided to do a search to see what ‘weird science’ she was reading off the internet. I found this website by typing in: “Warm water and weight loss, Urban legends” to my search engine. (No surprise here.)
Physiologically speaking, this is another silly myth from a non-medical website. Think about it…Do you REALLY think the cold water you just drank, STAYS COLD after being in your stomach (and mixing with your warm hydrochloric acid and other foods if present) at body temperature? We’d all be in serious trouble. Also, your stomach doesn’t empty that fast. If it does, you have another problem…
Say your cold water just managed to shove a few fat globules through the pyloric sphincter into your small intestine…do you think your intestines are cold enough to keep it solid?
When fats remain solid or congealed, they pass on out of the body, unabsorbed. Sounds like a better argument for drinking cold water instead, eh?
Just as the respiratory tract helps to warm and humidify the cold winter air before it hits our lungs, the alimentary tract warms cold food/water for digestion and absorption.
If drinking cold water actually thwarted weight loss, and warm water made a difference in pounds lost, believe me, it would be in the medical journals and make the news! Weight loss boils down to calories ingested and calories expended, whether or not the calories ingested are cold or hot. If you like drinking warm water, go for it. Don’t believe everything you read off the internet and check out the author and source.
Just for fun, do a search on “Drinking Cold water and weight loss” and see how many hits you get.
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- Kaye
  July 19, 2011 at 4:02 pm
  I appreicate your views on this topic and I am thankful you wrote on it. I can’t stand warm water for drinking and you are right, your ideology definitely wins me over!
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Acker
November 18, 2010 at 1:32 pm
Just saw Dr. Oz show. Coffee (regular) can help prevent many types of cancer.
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- Roger
  June 28, 2011 at 3:49 pm
  LOL… “Dr Oz Show”… I have never heard of anything less scientific.
  And you do know the World Health Organisation has classed coffee as potentially carcinogenic (that means there is some SCIENTIFIC evidence to suggest it causes cancerous cells to be produced) right?
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Nydia Schueller
April 1, 2011 at 5:31 am
I am continuously searching online for ideas that can benefit me. Thanks!
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Zahra
April 22, 2011 at 8:59 pm
First of all I want to say that the writer must be confused about digestion on several counts; in Chinese medicine we call the stomach the cooking pot, and cold water puts out the fire, so it can harm or at least slow down the first part of the process, BUT, the body will heat any substance consumed in a relatively short time – meaning, any fats, etc. will be melted in short order. The very notion that fats could become congealed by anything cold, and remain in that state for long – is somewhat ridiculous. By the time it leaves the stomach and enters to duodenum to be broken down by bile from the liver/gall bladder, it will have been liquified, in any case.
Protein is not only digested in the stomach, but the first part is critical, for beginning the breaking down
process. It will continue in the small intestine, but if it was interfered with in the stomach it will possibly suffer incomplete digestion, depending on each person’s unique makeup. Some people seem like they are not even slightly phased by ice cold beverages, and many seem to get away with it, while others will experience indigestion. We are all different, and the body is amazingly adaptable, so I do think it’s also a question of what you are accustomed to. If you try to change your habits all of a sudden, it can take awhile for the body to adapt to new circumstances too. I recommend slowly transitioning, and being patient as you try new things. Give your body time to respond and don’t be disappointed if you don’t get the results you want immediately.
I think fats are poorly understood and unnecessarily feared. We have an almost pathological understanding of the function of fats. They are such important building blocks for most of the endocrine systems and hormones in the body that we put an extraordinary stress on these systems when we restrict healthy fats. Low or no-fat diets result in malnutrition and will cause weight GAIN as the body struggles to find ways to adapt to the LACK! Granted, many of the fats we consume in processed foods have been altered to such an extent that they are not usable, or are even harmful. Healthy fats are the most natural protective substances on earth, and absolutely vital for health! Fats that have been heated, processed or changed in some unnatural fashion are placing an extra toxic load on the liver, but carbohydrates and sugars are even worse, and are quickly converted to fat by the liver as well.
On the other hand, I’ve heard that you will lose weight drinking very cold liquids because you have to burn so many calories to maintain body temp/equilibrium, it speeds up your metabolism. This has not ever been my experience tho’ because I only like tepid water, I really don’t enjoy cold or hot foods or beverages. I let my hot tea cool off, ice ream melt, cold pizza or leftovers out of the fridge sit on the counter for awhile, room temperature is best. I can’t stand to freeze my teeth or burn my tongue, and they say that leftovers are bad enough nutrition-wise without re-heating again! I absolutely refuse to use a microwave oven! I do have a very slow metabolism and would like to lose about thirty pounds, so maybe I should try to change my ways….hmmm
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san san ohn
June 3, 2011 at 8:25 pm
I like to drink the room temperature water but not too cold or warm water.Drinking normal temperature water is best and sometime i like to drink fruit juice with fridge water.Drinking water is our daily routine work and it is very important for our health.It`s depend on the change of weather in winter time we need to drink more water but not warm water .Warm water made your skin more dry and not so convenient for you.
In summer time people like to drink more cold water,ice cream and cold drink.Sometime all these made you to be heat stroke and no sweating.Later it can suffer of fever and stop sweating.At that time our traditional ways to cure is drinking warm green tea is best for your health.In some places in the green warm tea they put small amount of salt in it.It can help the body for sweating too much.
Anyhow when the weather is hot or cold we need to drink nearly 8 glasses of water daily.
Drinking water is very useful for weight lose.Before you eat the meals drinking water can reduce your meals and not to be weight gain.After doing the exercise drinking only cold water make you relax and fresh.It make you not to be hungry all the time and wt. lose in future.
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- Roger
  June 28, 2011 at 3:51 pm
  Your argument is flawless. I see no holes in any of it. And I am utterly convinced by all the scientific hard evidence you have provided. Thank you kind sir/madam.
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Halet
July 29, 2011 at 2:24 am
Actually, when you consume anything cold your body has to use energy to bring it down to your body temperature so it can be absorbed. For example, when you drink 2 quarts of water at 50 degrees fahrenheit your body burns 60 calories.
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Dude
August 29, 2011 at 12:45 pm
Sources?? How is it that cold water helps solidify the fats in the foods you ingest with it?
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Ari
September 2, 2011 at 5:19 am
Traditional Chinese Medicine per my Chinese Doc…recommends room temperature water. not hot and not cold. Also,all vegetables should be lightly cooked/steamed.etc..ingest some fat -meaning not fat free everything-is always necessary-this causes the gallbladder to empty thus avoiding future gallbladder problems.
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Venkatesan Santhanam
September 22, 2011 at 2:08 am
One thing is that for the last four plus years have been drinking cold water early morning as soon as I get up, till date health is good. Digestion has been good, still want to check if it is good to sip warm water during day time?
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Rick
December 13, 2011 at 6:15 pm
This discussion just seems absurd. I mean about 70% of our body mass is water/fliuds. It seems drinking a cold or warm sip of water is just immaterial to the what is going on in the body. imagine when you eat ice cream, by the time it hits your throat it’s liquid already so just think about the temperature of water. i am guessing by the time that small sip of water we take has passed our clavicle it’s just about the same temp as the rest of our body. i can’t imagine water we drink really “heats” or “cools” fat molecules that are already in our blood stream at 98.6. I think people should drink whatever water is best for them.
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Eddie
December 22, 2011 at 9:00 am
I don’t think the idea of stomach vasoconstriction would slow down water absorption, because the main site for water absorption is at the colon, which is a great 8 metres from the stomach…. by then it would have warmed up more than enough not to cause vasoconstriction..
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oliarguello
December 27, 2011 at 11:45 am
Wow a couple of paragraphs are the most poorly researched article I have read in a while. All others i have no qualms over….but……
Warm water helps fat move around??? Take some oil (or animal fat), a glass of warm, hot, and cold water. Add the oil/fat and look what happens……nothing…they wont mix. Fat/oil is hydrophobic and composed of non-polar covalent molecules whereas water is a polar covalent molecule. Simply put the two wont mix and since fat is a covalent molecule it takes A LOT of energy to break those bonds, the heat from consumed water wont cut it. Some warm water isnt gonna do anything in regards to that and by the time it gets absorbed from your stomach into your other systems, its going to reach a temperature equal to that of your body (or close to it) and not affect any adipose or muscle/organ stored fat.
And water is not going to do anything for your clogged arteries. Fat doesn’t clog your arteries, plaque created by oxidized cholesterol damage to the arteries does ( cholesterol is technically a hormone….which is associated with fat consumption due to the correlation of fat and cholesterol in food, but not necessarily the case because shrimp is HIGH in cholesterol but not fatty at all) as well as other factors (smoking, drinking, genetics, etc). Some warm water is not going to “dilute” or “warm up” the plaque enough to make any difference. Besides , again i will note, any water that gets into your blood system at that point is going to reach an equilibrium point with your body temperature.
One a side note : while cold water will decrease the effects of digestion, cold water aids in dissipating heat during a workout (which is why swimmers can eat a ton more calories than say a runner). While most people cant, or wont, submerge themselves in cold water in a workout…the key is to get rid of the heat, which is a bottleneck for workout performance. Cold water submersion/exposure also releases healthy hormones that aid in fat loss and immune boosting (there are some articles that dispute this, but ive read enough to be convinced of it).
If
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