Rhona Patrick: Sauna Use Improves Cardio Health and Prevents Muscle Atrophy

Yeah, we wanted to get one here. We're probably going to wind up doing that. Get one here. You should, because you have the sauna. I have two showers and the shower next to the sauna is kind of useless. So who uses the sauna here, Jamie? Just me. You don't use the sauna here? He uses it occasionally. Occasionally, yeah. I also had a gym I was going to for an hour. You do use the sauna though, right? Yeah. Yep. Yeah. I use it every day. I usually use it at home, but sometimes I use it here when I, like right after workouts. Like if I work out, I try to get a workout here before, you know, like before I do podcasts and I'll time it so they have an extra hour so I can get in the sauna. That's awesome. Yeah. It makes a big difference for me, but I also just, I think it might be a little too much before, like I'm always trying to regulate how much activity I do with whether or not I'm going to be exhausted when I do a podcast because I used to do yoga and then I would come out. I would get out of yoga at 11 or at 1030 and I would do a podcast at 12 and I was like, whoa, I think I better wait till one because I'd just be so, because 90 minute yoga classes in 105 degrees is fucking rough. It's intense. It's rough. Yeah. I've only done Bikram a couple times. I would love to like do it more. I loved it. Yeah. I really loved it. Well, I would wonder and I know there's there's supposedly some sort of Harvard study that's ongoing right now measuring all sorts of markers and people that have done hot yoga and whether or not it mimics heat shock proteins that are created in the sauna because the thing is like you are getting this incredible cardiovascular exercise because your heart's beating like crazy and you know, you're not doing cardio per se, but your heart rate goes, gets jacked because of the heat and the stress. And then on top of that, even though it's only 105 degrees, your body is heating up. You're, you're really sweating up a storm in there. I mean, it gets, I've taken some friends there that have never experienced it before and they're like, fucking yoga. Come on, bro. Yoga. And then they get in there and then I look over at them, 15 minutes in and they're like, fucking hey. And I'm like, yeah, it is told you it's not, it's not what you think it is because you're doing like yoga even uncoupled from the heat strip, like the hot part yoga is, is also like, it's pretty intense. Like holding those positions and stuff and like your heart rate does start to elevate. I mean, it's like just from that alone, adding on the sauna, which mimics moderate physical activity that's been shown, absolutely mimics it. And then all the, you know, studies that have shown that on top of that, I mean, that's like, it's, it's, it's super intense. It's super intense. The, the really cool thing about, and I want to get my mom, I think once we move the sauna like to our home where it's not like the office, like I want to, people that are not, people that are sedentary and people that are sedentary for whatever reason, maybe they're sedentary because they're disabled, or maybe they're sedentary because they've had a lifetime of being sedentary and it's, it is just hard to get them motivated to go exercise. Like the sauna to me is like, that's so important because it's giving these people a potential cardiovascular workout. No, it is that's been shown. It's giving them a cardiovascular workout without having to force them to go for a run or go on a bike. You know, the people think like when you tell them go sit in the sauna, they think of like a spa, like, yeah, I want to go do that. You get someone who's like, like my mom who she's, she's sedentary, you know, she's, she's not like a physically active person and she needs to be. But like the sauna, that's, that's kind of my goal is to get her doing, and we'll have to start slowly because you have to adapt. You know, the heat shock proteins help with that as you, the more, the more times you're exposed to heat stress and the more adapted you are, like the, the heat shock proteins increase quicker. And so it's part of the adaptation process as well of, of, you know, being able to handle the heat stress. But like, I want to get her to do that because like any, you know, any cardiovascular improvements can help her moods, can help her, her, you know, all cause mortality that's been shown, you know, four to seven times a week, 40, 40% lower all cause mortality. Cardiovascular related mortality is 50% lower. You know, so like, I think that's a really cool thing about the sauna is that you can get people that are disabled, people that can't go for a run, you know? I mean, I still think exercise, I mean, it's just the best thing ever, period for everything, you know, for everything. It's just going to overall improve the way you age and that's going to make you more robust and resilient to anything, you know? So, you know, to me is, there's so many benefits, but one of the big ones is that muscles feel better. They feel looser. They're not as sore. Like when I have hard workouts and I get in the sauna afterwards, I feel like my recovery is more rapid. Interesting. That's interesting. Yeah. I, because I don't do a lot of resistance training, shame on me. I don't, I don't have that same perspective, but it, there, there have been studies, at least where localized heat on people that had a limb immobilized. I don't remember what limb it was, but after a week, people that had the heat treatment, local heat treatment had almost 40% less muscle atrophy and in animal studies and like, I remember I like shared this animal study in an article I wrote years ago before the human study came out and like there were critics, well, it's animals and blah, blah, blah. You can't say it does this. And I would get on the mechanism. And they showed it was heat shock proteins and there was all, you know, like, and I was so happy when that human study came out. So it's like, told you, told you motherfucker. That's what I wanted to say.