During the Crusades in England was established one of the highest awards - the Order of the Bath, which at the time was handed over to the Knights, who succeeded under the devastating epidemics of cholera and plague to establish bath.

The best way to deep cleanse the skin is sauna (dry bath) and steam room (wet bath). Due to the heat the pores open, dead skin cells are rejected. Also favorable developments occur inside: blood circulation improves, blood flow to the skin improves, and skin acquires a pink tinge.

Part of the toxins is excreted from the body. But it is not through the skin, as stated recently. Effect of heat becomes available for kidney, they begin to operate hard in conjunction with an improved peristalsis and promote the excretion of harmful substances. Reasonable overheating improves the immune system, especially it is useful for the prevention of colds. But if you have already runny nose, neither sauna nor steam room help at this stage.

During the heating / cooling blood vessels receive an excellent exercise, after such baths the body stands high temperatures easier. People in the summer heat do not feel sluggish.

In the Russian bath temperature in the steam room rises in the range of 50 - 85 ° C, but the humidity reaches nearly 60 percent. In this atmosphere, a person sweats less than in the dry sauna, but significantly enhanced cleansing effect on the body due to the settling of the condensed water.

The maximum time in the steam room should not exceed 20 minutes. But if 10 minutes is enough for your, you need to go out.

You may come into the sauna after washing in the shower and drying yourself. Feet should be warmed. To do this, it is desirable to make a preliminary hot footbath.

You should not wear a swimsuit and anything on your head.

The heat in the sauna is stronger in the upper zones. Trained people initially can sit on the top shelf, and after the first sweating can move lower, on the middle bench. Untrained people start and remain on the middle shelf.

It is best to lie down in the sauna. If there is no place for it, legs still need to be placed at rest.

After 10 minutes you can pour yourself with cold water with essential oils. The steam, which rises from the body, stimulates the skin nerves and respiratory ways.

Before the start of the sauna, it is better not to pour yourself. The last two minutes in the sauna spend on the bottom shelf, sitting up straight with head bowed down. This will help you avoid dizziness when standing up.

After the sauna necessarily go back and forth in the cold dressing room without clothes and breathe deeply. But do not let yourself be frozen.

Pour yourself with cold water or stand under a cold shower.

Sit down and take a warm footbath.

Once the skin is warmed again, pour yourself again with cold water or dip in the cold pool. Continue this cooling ritual until stop sweating. Wipe and lie in the dressing room.

Mistakes to avoid:

• Sit on the bottom, the coldest bench to stay longer in the sauna.
• Sit on the top shelf, with legs dangling down, and holding head underneath the ceiling.
• Pour with warm water instead of cold after a sauna.
• Not to go out in the cold room or walk around there in clothes. This reduces the effect of hardening.
• Drink in the sauna or in the breaks between entries. Even worse - take alcohol. Blood vessels, already extended, may extend to the threat of collapse.
• After the sauna dip in the pool without flushing out sweat. This is unhygienic.
• Swim between entries in the sauna and after it. The water pressure can harm extended blood vessels.
• Combing hair in the sauna. This is harmful for the hair.
• Talk in the sauna. It is a place of relaxation and conversation can disturb people seeking peace there.

Steam room

There are two ritual of baths: Russian and Turkish.

Russian bath has the following order:

• Having wiped after a shower, people go to preheat in a warm room. Then they cool down.
• If there is a pool with warm water in the bath, they spend a few minutes in it, then pour themselves with cold water in the shower and carefully wipe off.
• And only after that they entry the steam room, where they spend 10 - 15 minutes at about 45 ° C at a humidity close to 100%.
• Just as after heating in the sauna, a body after the steam room should be cooled in the shower and in the pool.
• Before the following entering, it is necessary to have rest for 10 - 20 minutes and take a warm footbath.

In the Turkish baths there is no preheating stage. People in the steam room just climb up a step every 5 minutes. After 15 minutes they take ice cold shower. In traditional public baths the following stage is massage with brush and then a lukewarm shower and half an hour rest. Alternation of heat and cold - like in sauna - can be repeated two more times.

Weight loss, which is achieved in a bath, can be hold for a short time, because profuse sweating causes it. The evaporated water must be recovered as soon as possible. However, fat is "melted" neither in the sauna nor in the bath. Yet in both procedures, the metabolism is activated, and this has a stabilizing effect on the weight and can support diet.

Immediate compensation of loss of water after the sauna is very important for the normal functioning of the internal organs, especially the kidneys. In addition, it is necessary to restore the minerals released with sweat, not to disturb the electrolytic process. It is better to drink mineral water or fruit and vegetable juices without sugar. Be careful with alcohol: it further robs the body water rather than to compensate for its loss.

Special tips for those who sweat for their beauty.

Hair care with thermal effect: due to the heat of the sauna and steam room remedies deeply penetrate the scalp. Nevertheless, do not overdo it; wear a headscarf to avoid flowing down.

Red streaks on the skin cannot tolerate the heat.

Skillful, rational use of bath treatment stimulates and improves blood circulation and metabolic processes and develops flexibility and mobility of joints.

High temperature in the steam room is detrimental to many harmful viruses.

If you attend bath a short time after eating, under-digested, harmful substances move from the stomach and liver to the organs, causing clogging of blood vessels and capillaries. Bath visiting on an empty stomach dries body very much and wears the organism.

Good Russian bath is useful for those suffering thinness: during the procedure, it is desirable after warming to rub with fat or oil to close penetrated into the pores water and hold it under the skin. At the same time, water should be poured on the floor to maintain the high level of humidity. After a bath such patients benefit from relaxing in the dressing room and drinking barley water or milk.

If the water in the bath contains soda, sulfur, salt, or if larkspur, laurel berry, sulfur, etc. were boiled in this water, then it has a softening and dissolving effect and prevents a rush of blood and lymph to ulcers. One cannot go to the bath right after exercises, need some rest.

Those wishing to gain weight should visit bath after a meal, unless they have a predisposition to vascular occlusion and those wishing to lose weight and dissolve excesses should go to the bath hungry and stay there for a long time. As usual health improving procedures one should attend bath, fully digested the contents of the stomach and liver, but not hungry (1.5 - 2 hours after eating).

Right after visiting the bath or while being there it is harmful to drink cold as well as hot water.

During perspiration, one cannot be quickly cooled, since the dirty elements present on the skin can be absorbed rapidly.

Length of stay in the steam room depends on air temperature of the bath, its humidity and personal tolerance. One entry for 4 minutes will be enough for beginners. In the future, you need to add 30 seconds to each entry and bring the total residence time in the steam room for 2 - 3 entries to 15 - 20 minutes. Frequency of visits to the bath is once every 7 - 10 days.

After bathing, you can clean up with soap and a washcloth, trying to keep rubbing washcloth towards the center. Excessive sweating is cured through more sweatshop procedure - like cures like. You can rinse the head with button or young birch leaves extract. This procedure is very useful for the skin and strengthens hair. It is also useful to bathe with hips extract - it eliminates body odor.

Children from 3-5 years may visit sauna. At this temperature should be somewhat less than for adults, - 60 ° C and the residence time in the steam room 4 - 5 min. Children over 12 years old may bathe at 70°C. They are allowed 2 - 3 entering the steam room. The total duration of the procedure in this case should not exceed 15 minutes.

Bath promotes excretion of the decay products from the joints. Therefore, with diseases of the joints, particularly with deforming arthritis, bath, especially when combined with massage and broom is the most effective treatment.

Heat, lashing with broom, contrast shower, redistribution of blood and lymph in the body contribute to the influx of oxygen and nutrients; it activates blood circulation and enhances the redox processes in the joints. Steam treatments stimulate regenerative processes, including bone tissues, prevent the development of arthritis, contractures, and contribute to the rapid restoration of body functions.

Steaming is preferably with a broom made of various medicinal plants.

Nettle broom is made small, before using it is put into hot water for 1 - 2 minutes, and then for 3 - 4 min - in the cold (procedure is repeated 1 - 2 times), then it can be used. Nevertheless, before you should come into the steam house and just stay there for 5 - 7 minutes, or it is even better to lash yourself with birch or oak broom for 2 - 4 min.

However, of the same importance are not only bathing procedures, but also the material from which the bath is made, wood with which the bath is fired. People try to make baths of pine or cedar, preferably lower crown of oak. Steam room is finished with basswood, oak or cedar (pine). Also, equally important is the correct masonry stoves in the baths (saunas). Many things depend on it, including proper thermal regulation.

It is better to fire bath with birch or oak firewood - they give a lot of heat and quickly heat stones in the oven. It is better to combine wood of coniferous trees in the furnace with the wood of aspen, which, although give a little heat, but clear chimney from soot.

Massage procedures using a broom

Implementation of various manipulations with broom in the steam room is a kind of body massage that activates the skin, increases blood circulation and sweating. One needs to use broom not haphazardly, but perform procedures in sequence. Steaming with a broom does not mean that it is necessary to lash yourself like mad.

This is a big mistake of beginners. It is advisable to take a pair of oak or birch brooms to the bath. Fresh brooms can be used at once, and dry should be lowered into the bowl with boiling water, cover with another basin and steam 5 - 7 minutes, until the leaves are soft. But it is better to steam brooms in lime tree tubs. For the best steam injection, the broom should not be wet. Wet broom becomes hard, leaves stick together, and it becomes worse. What is the sequence of using a broom?

Stroking massage - one of the first methods of using a broom in the steam room, where the circulation is enhanced not only in skin but also in the deeper tissues. Thus, there is a redistribution of blood, lymph and interstitial fluid throughout the body. Essential oils in the leaves and branches of broom, get to the steamed skin, can easily penetrate into it and improve metabolism.

It turns like a cosmetic effect on the skin, preventing premature aging. It is better to go to steam room together; one lies on his belly and the other starts to "work" on him with two brooms Hands of the partner must be in canvas or leather spacious gloves, otherwise the palms will quickly blisters. The massage starts from stroking from the feet to the head and back. In the reverse direction, one broom should slide on one side, and the second - on the other; brooms then moved along the side of the pelvis, thighs and calves. Such dense stroking must be repeated 2-3 times.

Wrap - a procedure that is done after the massage strokes. Brooms are lifted up, hot air is grabbed with them and they are dropped on the back, clutching for 1 - 3 sec. Such broom compress is made 4 - 5 times on each part of the body. This compress procedure is particularly useful for radiculitis, injuries, after physical exercises.

Stretching - a massage technique that is recommended for pain in the sacrolumbar region. Both brooms are put on the waist and at the same time are thrown aside, one broom to the feet, the second - to the back of the head. Such movements are also produced on the shoulders and knees. Brooms should fit to touch the body and do not move around in the air. If the steam room's temperature is high and someone does not stand the heat, begging for mercy, then brooms must be moved slowly, not lifting them up. At the same time, brooms should be periodically wet in cool water. Such a massage is repeated for 3 - 4 times.

Lashing, splashing are the most emotional techniques of massage treatments with a broom.

Easy, fast movement of the broom end on the body performs lashing. First on back in all directions, then the lumbus, pelvis, thighs, calves and feet. Duration of treatment is 1-2 minutes. This kind of self-massage can be extended further, stronger procedure splashing. Splashing is massage technique when broom is lifted up, grabbing hot air and 2 - 3 splashes are made with broom all over the body. This massage procedure should be accompanied by a periodical compress.

Rubbing is a final of pair procedures with a broom. Procedure is as follows: take the broom in the left hand for the handle and with right hand pushing slightly hardwood portion gradually rub the whole body. Upper body can be rubbed in all directions, and the limbs only along them. It is desirable that the motion of the broom in rubbing and bumps were directed toward the center (toward the heart). When rubbed on toward the center pressure on the broom should be strengthened.

Vitality of all these procedures must comply with the temperature in the steam room. If it is low, make more vigorous splashing and other motions with the broom. If the temperature is high, the movement of the broom should be cautious, soft. The broom should be periodically wet in cold water.

At first entry into the steam room broom use duration should be no more than 6 - 8 minutes. In the second set duration should be reduced to 3 - 5 minutes, and repeated massage treatments in a second pass is performed on the individual parts of the body in a milder form.

Beginners are recommended to use a broom in the first and subsequent visits to the steam room. Only gradually bringing time in the steam room to 8 - 10 minutes, a beginner may for 1 - 2 minutes to allow himself enjoining pleasure of broom procedures. At the end of the pair of broom procedures one cannot stand up abruptly. It is necessary to sit on the bottom shelf for 1 - 2 minutes, and then you can leave the steam room.

The therapeutic effect of the baths

Steam bath is usually characterized with air temperature from 40 to 60°C at 90 - 100% relative humidity and dry air bath with air temperature 70 - 90°C at 5 - 15% relative humidity. These features play a significant role in the impact on the human body and lead in particular to significant differences in the nature of the physiological reaction - thermal regulation.

Conditions of high temperatures impede heat transfer, resulting in impaired thermal equilibrium: heat is delayed and accumulated in the body, which in turn leads to an increase in body temperature. It mobilizes thermal regulation function to remove excess heat from the body, which can occur in two ways: reduction of heat generation in the cells and organs (chemical thermal regulation) and heat gain through sweating, widening of blood vessels in the skin and lungs, rapid breathing (physical thermal regulation).

These mechanisms can provide thermal equilibrium at a certain time, depending on the ambient temperature and humidity. Tim of staying in the bath should not exceed the level when the body is no longer able to cope with the conditions of high temperature. Characteristic signs of overheating are pallor, dizziness, nausea, and incoordination. A factor determining beginning of the body's reaction to the heat is an irritation of the corresponding fields of the hypothalamus.

In a steam room with hot air warming of overall body is relatively slow, but because of supplying heat to the upper respiratory ways and soft outer portion of the neck temperature changes pretty fast at the carotid artery. Air humidity is the main difference between the steam rooms and dry-air baths. Dry air, compared with the wet one makes it easy to evaporate the moisture from the skin surface, which significantly lowers the body temperature. The lower the relative humidity, the lower its thermal conductivity is, and therefore heating of body tissues is less. Thus, the conditions of sauna facilitate processes of thermal regulation and tolerance to high temperatures.

High relative humidity hinders moisture evaporation from the skin (perspiration is more visually expressed in the steam bath than in dry, sweat "streams", but this way of heat transfer is inefficient, because there is no sufficient sweat evaporation), lungs and respiratory ways, it contributes to the rapid and strong heating of tissues (thermal conductivity of water and moist air is higher than dry) and impedes gas exchange in the lungs (a significant amount of air is saturated with vapors and oxygen-depleted).

All this accelerates overheating, leading to a rapid disruption of thermal regulation and deterioration of health. Steam bath conditions are more significant load to the human body than those of dry-air bath, and, above all, for the cardiovascular, respiratory and nervous systems. But when used correctly this bath is useful as a method of hardening and recovery, as well as hygiene product.

Dry-air baths are indicated for people who are less seasoned or under recovery, for the elderly, children and women, as well as for athletes using a bath with a view to recuperate after strenuous exercise, before the competition, when it is necessary to keep a good shape.

After any type of physical activity sauna is used for:

• relaxing of tired muscles;
• early withdrawal of metabolism products from them and from the blood;
• reducing excitations in motor zone of the cerebral cortex (which occur during stimulation of movement in the locomotor system);
• as a means of emotional rehabilitation.

Contraindications to bath procedures

Bath is contraindicated in epilepsy, pulmonary tuberculosis, tumors, heart failure, severe hypertension and cardiac angina. It is prohibited to bathe in the acute stage of disease and exacerbation of chronic diseases. In cardiovascular diseases. Those who are sick or thyroid vein, before going to the bath must first consult a physician. Pregnant women in the first three months are better to avoid saunas, because the body is too sensitive to external influences. In acute infections, bronchitis or flu sauna and steam room rather worsen the overall condition.

Steam bath is contraindicated for those who have widened vessels on the face. These vessels have lost the ability to narrow again. In order to prevent them from widening more one needs to avoid anything that may intensify the blood supply to the skin.