SYDNEY, Nov. 7 (Xinhua) -- Using a fan and wetting the skin can reduce the risk of deadly heart strain in hot and humid weather, an Australian-led research has found.
In a study published on Thursday, researchers from the University of Sydney and Canada's Montreal Heart Institute found that using a fan in hot and humid weather reduces cardiac strain in older people.
Funded by the Australian government's National Health and Medical Research Council, the research looked at the efficacy of low-cost cooling strategies for older adults at a heightened health risk during hot weather.
Older participants with and without heart disease were exposed to two environments, 38 degrees Celsius with 60 percent humidity and 45 degrees Celsius with 15 percent humidity, to represent common heatwave extremes.
The researchers found that fan use with and without skin wetting in hot and humid conditions reduced potentially deadly cardiac strain.
However, in very hot and dry conditions fan use had an adverse effect by tripling the increase in cardiac strain, which could be fatal, due to convection forcing more heat into the body. Skin wetting used on its own was found to effectively reduce cardiac strain in very hot and dry conditions.
Ollie Jay, a co-author of the study and director of the Heat and Health Research Center and Thermal Ergonomics Laboratory at the University of Sydney, said that health hazards from extreme heat are becoming increasingly common because of climate change.
"Older adults, especially those with heart disease, are at greater risk due to the strain that hot temperatures put on the heart. Understanding the impacts of different cooling strategies on the heart is important to help vulnerable people stay well during hot summer weather," he said in a media release. ■
