The reasons
Many people are aware of keeping their feet warm. In this case, there is a saying that parents willingly use when persuading a child to put on warm socks and bypass puddles while walking along the street. It is with wet feet that most of the autumn and winter colds in children and adults are associated. Why does this happen and is it possible to avoid the consequences of hypothermia of the legs?
The feet are reflex zones. They are sensitive to exposure low temperatures, therefore, when in contact with a cold floor, walking in wet shoes in the cold, a spasm of the vessels of the mucous membranes occurs respiratory tract... At first glance, it is difficult to understand how the legs and the respiratory system are interconnected, so you should find out what effects hypothermia of the legs entails:
- Violation of the blood supply to the mucous membrane of the respiratory tract.
- Decreased local immunity.
- Reproduction of pathogenic microorganisms.
In this case, infectious agents are not introduced from the outside - they are constantly on the mucous membrane, they are activated in conditions of a decrease in immune reactivity.
Hypothermia of the legs cannot be determined solely by touching the feet. If a person walks barefoot, and the skin of his feet is pale and cool, this can be considered as a manifestation of adaptation to cold - the vessels narrow so that heat is not lost. In such conditions, a kind of training of the body takes place, preparation for future contacts with the cold. This mechanism is used in the hardening technique - gradual accustoming to contact with low temperatures allows you to count on subsequent resistance to it. It is worth worrying if the feet are noticeably cold, "icy", the skin becomes marbled with a tinge of cyanosis. This indicates that a person freezes - and, first of all, his feet are freezing.
Complaints of a patient with a cold are quite typical, familiar to most people. After hypothermia of the legs, the following symptoms are observed:
- general malaise, weakness, fatigue;
- headache, dizziness, fever;
- runny nose, sore throat, cough - dry or with phlegm.
A common consequence of hypothermia of the feet is tonsillitis, or tonsillitis - inflammation of the tonsils. The occurrence of this pathology is most expected in patients who suffer from chronic tonsillitis - in this case, we are talking about an exacerbation.
The catarrhal form of tonsillitis is characterized by dryness, sore throat, sore throat, aggravated by swallowing. Irradiation of pain in the ear is likely. Patients are worried about chills, body temperature rarely rises above 38-38.5 ° C. There is weakness, pain in muscles and joints, headache.
In the lacunar and follicular form, the disease is manifested by a high body temperature (39-39.5 ° C), pronounced general weakness, severe pain in the throat. Sometimes patients complain of increased salivation. In some sources, the listed variants of tonsillitis are described as successive stages in the development of the pathological process.
The main signs of a cold after hypothermia of the legs are weakness, fever, runny nose, sore throat.
Thermal treatments
Everyone knows about the primary prevention of hypothermia: in cold weather, dress warmly, on a rainy evening, choose waterproof shoes. It is advisable to pay attention to methods of preventing the common cold, designed for situations where hypothermia has already occurred. These include:
Bathing warming is effective if there is no frostbite, serious disturbances due to the general exposure to cold. It is better to choose the temperature of the water based on your constant preferences; do not ignore nausea, heart palpitations, shortness of breath if they occur in a room filled with steam. Under no circumstances should small children be left unattended in the bathroom.
"Soaring feet" is possible only with an adequate response to high temperature water added to the container. The procedure is dangerous for young children due to the high risk of burns.
Mustard plasters and warming ointments have a local irritating effect, which increases blood flow in the tissues. The advantages are affordable price, ease of use. Irritants should not be used if:
- allergies;
- neoplasms;
- pustular lesions;
- violation of the integrity of the skin;
- high body temperature.
You can not carry out thermal procedures:
- with frostbite;
- with severe general hypothermia;
- with fever.
Thermal procedures are contraindicated for persons with cardiovascular diseases, microcirculation disorders, neoplasms in the lower extremities, as well as for pregnant women.
Primary prevention is most effective for preventing colds.
To cure a cold, you need to rest more, exclude physical activity. Bed rest is mandatory during the fever period. The diet should include easily digestible food. You should avoid spicy foods, drink enough liquid - water, compotes, tea.
Medical therapy for colds is usually limited to symptomatic agents. 
The leading positions are taken by antipyretic drugs (paracetamol), which can not only fight fever, but also reduce the intensity of sore throat, eliminate headache... Fever is a defensive reaction aimed at destroying an infectious agent, so it should not be suppressed unless absolutely necessary. It is worth taking antipyretics at temperatures above 38-38.5 ° C (the exception is "white" hyperthermia).
Decongestants (xylometazoline) can help with nasal congestion and should not be taken longer than a few days within the acceptable dosage range. The use of decongestants for the treatment of young children is highly undesirable.
With tonsillitis, antibiotic therapy is indicated. Treatment is complemented by antiseptics in the form of tablets for resorption (decatilen), the appointment of rinses (solution of furacilin, broth of sage, chamomile), sprays (orasept).
Treatment is carried out under the supervision of a doctor, taking into account the results of laboratory tests.
First of all, for a child on a walk in the cold season, hypothermia of the legs is dangerous. And if the legs are wet, then this happens especially quickly.
Why shouldn't your child get wet and cold feet? The toes and feet are the area that is reflexively connected to the nose and throat area. Frozen legs - vessels narrowed - nasopharyngeal vessels reflexively narrow - local immunity decreases - infection develops.
Hands and feet are always the first to freeze. Firstly, there is no fatty tissue, but there are many vessels, and secondly, the blood is redirected to the internal organs, because it is more important to maintain a normal temperature there. And only then, if a person does not get into a warm room, general hypothermia occurs. If the child's feet are wet, then these processes are much accelerated.
Even if everything was limited to only chilly legs, for some children this is enough to make their throats hurt. As we already wrote above, hypothermia of the feet reflexively causes narrowing of the vessels of the throat, which means that local immunity decreases.
It is the tonsils located in the throat that are the first obstacle to infection. Although even in a healthy person, a large number of diverse flora lives on the mucous membranes of the mouth and nose, including opportunistic and even pathogenic. To get sick, a weakened child does not even need at this moment for a sick person to sneeze at him.
The narrowing of the blood vessels leads to the fact that our protective cells and representatives of the immune system do not enter the right amount to the focus of infection, and pathogens have time to multiply thoroughly.
To prevent the child's feet from freezing during a walk
- wear shoes suitable for the weather, of high quality and waterproof, of a suitable size
- organize the walk so that the baby does not sit still - runs, jumps and climbs
- If you are putting on socks, then it is undesirable to choose cotton ones, since they absorb moisture well, put on socks containing wool
- do not wear too warmly - babies get hot when the temperature seems normal to us, then both the back and legs sweat, as a result, hypothermia is possible
How do you know why your feet are wet? If you lift the insole, then everything becomes clear: if it is damp under it or at the junction between the sole and the bootleg, then the shoes are leaking, and if it is dry, the legs are sweating.
If a child's feet are frozen
This does not mean that he will get sick. Especially if you warm them up quickly. For example, make a bath with warm water, rub your feet with a towel, use a warming ointment.
The best prevention method is, of course, hardening. This does not mean that you need to douse your baby in the morning. cold water... It is enough just not to create greenhouse conditions:
- do not wrap
- keep the temperature at home no higher than 20 degrees
- often ventilate
- walk barefoot
- do not heat food from the refrigerator, you can even use ice cream as a hardener for the throat (starting with one teaspoon a day)
Stay smart parents and take care of your children!
The feminine desire to look fashionable and good makes them go out on an autumn evening in thin tights, tapered shoes or boots, they completely forget about the need to keep their feet warm. After half an hour, the legs are freezing, and in my head there are only thoughts about how to quickly get to a warm place.
You run home and think about how to get your legs back to normal, how to get warm quickly. If you still haven't drawn any conclusions from previous situations and often put stress on your legs, make yourself a little reminder and hang it in the bathroom:
- Prepare a bath with hot salted water, lower your feet into it.
- After the "hot" procedure, apply your daily cream on the soles of the feet, rub it well.
- Put on warm socks, warm your feet with a blanket.
If you came home from the street, look at the memo and understand that the hot water has been turned off at home and there is no way to provide "ambulance" to the legs, then take note of one more memo with an alcohol compress:
- Rub your feet with a dry towel (you can soak in hot water), massage all fingers.
- Take socks, maybe old ones with holes, because their soles should be moistened with vodka (any vodka or alcohol), socks should be put on their feet.
- On top of the socks, put on one more socks, but denser and coarser, preferably woolen.
Heat in the legs after the procedure will appear immediately.
If you want to “unfreeze” your limbs as quickly as possible and, by a lucky coincidence, a bag of hot ground red pepper is lost in the kitchen cabinet, then you can pour it directly into your socks.
Maybe when you come home, you have a desire to warm your feet in a fragrant bath? To do this, you need the following ingredients: sea salt, lavender or rosemary oil, half a glass of milk. Three tablespoons sea \u200b\u200bsalt must be mixed with a teaspoon of butter, with milk. This mixture is poured into the water, after which the frozen feet are immersed in the water. Your legs will thank you, plus they will receive additional nutrition.
It happens that your feet get cold not only in cold weather, what should you do in such cases? To begin with, engage in monitoring the changes in your own body, pay attention to what other symptoms you have when your feet are cold. When you start to freeze after eating, you need to pay attention to the patency of your bile ducts; when there is a slowdown in the pulse, arrhythmia, the hair quickly becomes greasy, and the nails are constantly breaking - there may be problems with the thyroid gland; when the feet swell, there are pains in the lower leg when walking, the veins have become more noticeable and widened, a venous mesh has appeared - make an appointment with a doctor rather, you can skip the initial stage of varicose veins.
Often, a malfunction of the heart can cause your feet to freeze. If you are going up the stairs and feel short of breath, and after drinking the liquid, swelling of the feet appeared, you have a direct road to a cardiologist and an electrocardiogram recording. It would be nice to do a blood test and ultrasound of the vessels of the legs.
If your feet are freezing not only from the weather, then do not be alarmed ahead of time, because everything can be just because of the specific structure of your body. Do not forget that alcohol and nicotine have a negative effect on blood vessels. Make sure that there are as few of them as possible in your life, ideally they should be completely abandoned. Get in the habit of taking a daily contrast shower, remember to massage your feet. Going outside, grease your feet with mink or badger fat.