3 Surprising Health Benefits Of Air Conditioning
Almost everybody loves walking into a cool, air conditioned room after being outside on a hot summer day. What you may not realize, however, is that air conditioning doesn't just feel good, it's good for you. Using well maintained air conditioner to beat the heat just might be your key to better sleep, easier breathing, and fewer headaches.
A Cool Way to Get to Sleep
There is very little that is less fun than tossing and turning all night before you have to go to work. On those nights when you just can't get comfortable enough to sleep, turning down the temperature or opening up the vents might be the answer to your dilemma.
While it's going to be difficult to get to sleep if you're too hot or too cold, experts say that cooler temperatures improve your ability to get to sleep. Being too hot, on the other hand, can lead to even more restlessness. The trick is in having enough blankets to reach a comfortable in a cool room.
It makes sense. After a certain point, there's not much you can do to cool yourself off when the temperature is too high. Once you've taken the blankets off, what's left to do? However, if you're in a cool room with the right amount of bedding, you can just add blankets until you reach a comfortable sleeping temperature. Turn the AC down at night, and try fleece blankets or lightweight comforters for bedding that will keep you comfortable without being too heavy and restricting.
Chill Out and Breathe Easier
If you have asthma, COPD, or other breathing related difficulties, heat and humidity can make it almost impossible to breathe at night. If you're overheated, you can end up feeling like an elephant is sitting on your chest, and trying to breathe humid air can be like trying to breathe underwater.
Air conditioning helps in two ways. For one thing, it dries out the air, which is why it's recommended to help people with COPD breathe better. That's not all, though. A central air conditioning unit is filtered, which means that it's actually filtering out some of the harmful debris and pollutants in the air that make it hard to breathe. As long as the air conditioner is well maintained, it works like a charm.
An air conditioner that isn't well maintained can be a problem, though. If the filters aren't changed regularly, they can get clogged with debris and send all of those pollutants back into the air in the home. If the unit itself is dirty and not tuned up regularly, debris can find its way into the duct work, and make the air even more difficult to breathe. If you need your air conditioner to help you breathe better, it's important to make sure that you change the filters on a regular basis and have your air conditioner checked out by an HVAC professional at least once a year.
Lower the Temperature, Lessen the Headaches
If you're one of the many Americans that suffer from migraine headaches, you know that the best way to prevent them is to avoid headache triggers. As it turns out, summer heat may be one of the triggers that you need to watch out for. Over a period of seven years, researchers found that for every nine degree increase in the temperature, the chance of a headache severe enough to require a trip to the hospital increased by 7.5%.
The weather doesn't have to become unseasonably warm for a headache to occur, the temperature just has to increase. The benefit of a central air conditioning system for migraine sufferers isn't just that they can turn the air down and make the house or building cooler, it's that they can maintain a steady temperature that's comfortable. By keeping the temperature steady, migraine sufferers are less likely to experience a heat induced migraine.
Central air conditioning installation and maintenance are just a question of comfort. Your AC unit can contribute to your continued good health as well.