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When most people think of intravenous (IV) therapy, they think of chemotherapy, blood transfusions, and other clinical treatments that require IV lines to work properly.
They don't necessarily see the potential health benefits IV therapy could have on their overall health and wellness.
Some healthcare professionals call intravenous therapy a medical massage because it can feel like that's what is happening to your body. There are many other benefits of intravenous therapy, including pain relief, boosting energy levels, reducing inflammation and swelling, boosting immune system function, reducing stress levels, and much more.
The primary benefit that most people seek when receiving infusions is symptom relief or treatment for an acute condition. Here are the five benefits of IV therapy.
It Helps to Restore Proper Hydration Levels: IV therapy helps restore proper hydration levels. Restoring fluid balance allows the body to feel energized and less fatigued.
It helps provide nourishment: IV therapy helps provide nutrition, especially when you don't feel well enough to eat or have a loss of appetite, by intravenously providing vitamins, minerals, proteins, and other nutrients directly into your body.
It is great at flushing out toxins: IV therapy flushes out toxins in your body. You may experience skin conditions, gastrointestinal distress, or memory problems when toxic build-up.
It provides pain relief: IV therapy provides pain relief. Sometimes, when you feel ill, you may not feel like taking medicine orally, or you may have difficulty absorbing oral medication due to nausea or vomiting. In these cases, an injection may be more beneficial in providing pain relief.
It helps to boost your immune system: IV therapy boosts your immune system. Sometimes when you feel run down, ill, or fatigued, you may have a compromised immune system. This means you are more likely to get sick or that your symptoms may be more severe than usual.
There are several ways in which intravenous therapy is useful in helping improve a person's appearance. Getting nutrients, vitamins, minerals, electrolytes, and other nutrients directly into your bloodstream will have an immediate impact on your skin health.
This is especially true when it comes to hydration—especially if you suffer from a deficiency that can lead to dry skin or eczema. The easiest way to deal with these issues is to drink plenty of water each day, but if you find yourself constantly thirsty or fatigued despite your best efforts, consider getting an IV infusion instead.
You may be surprised by how much it helps. The effects usually last about 4-6 hours after treatment; make sure you bring sunglasses, so no one notices when you start squinting midday.
Intravenous therapy can be used to treat deficiencies in key nutrients such as vitamins, minerals, amino acids, enzymes, water-soluble fiber, herbs, or phytonutrients. Vitamin C deficiency is a common concern among many Americans.
Clinical trials have shown that intravenous vitamin C helps protect skin from harmful UV rays. A vitamin deficiency is more than just an inconvenience; it can also prevent your body from working at maximum efficiency—even if you eat well.
Treating various nutrient deficiencies with IV therapy can ensure optimal health. IV therapy should never replace healthy eating food, but it's an excellent complement to it.
Alcohol is a diuretic that removes water from your body; if you drink heavily enough over long enough periods, your blood volume will drop significantly, causing dehydration which leads to impaired organ function, including your brain.
This makes hangovers worse by affecting every part of your body. IV therapy uses a balanced saline solution (0.9% NaCl) to restore fluids quickly while avoiding stomach irritation. It also addresses common electrolyte deficiencies (like magnesium) associated with alcohol abuse.
An IV after heavy drinking can help avoid complications associated with liver damage, dangerous drops in blood pressure, hypoglycemia, and severe electrolyte abnormalities. Drinking lots of water doesn't hydrate as well as an injection because intravenous rehydration bypasses many mechanisms in your gastrointestinal tract, meaning more fluid gets into your bloodstream faster, resulting in faster relief from symptoms such as headache and feeling sick.
When it comes to improving your health, it's important to take a holistic approach. Getting an IV drip may seem like extreme treatment at first, but it offers some unique benefits that you won't get from a normal fitness routine.
For one thing, intravenous treatments use vitamins and minerals directly into your bloodstream. It bypasses your digestive system completely, which means your body can immediately access nutrients more efficiently than if they had been eaten normally. This can be helpful when you're trying to lose weight; avoiding processed foods is one key way to drop pounds quickly, as many require digestion before their full benefits can be accessed by your body.
An intravenous drip commonly uses saline or another form of simple salt solution. This fluid is meant to hydrate your body, but it also has a strong effect on your heart rate. When you receive an IV, your heart rate will likely drop slightly and stay steady for a short period. How long depends on many factors, such as age, health status, what kind of fluids you're receiving, and how quickly they're infused.
In very rare cases—especially in patients with heart problems—an intravenous infusion can cause a drop in blood pressure so severe that it causes dizziness or fainting.
The average treatment duration for mild to moderate dehydration is about 2.5 hours. That's how long it takes to replenish much-needed water, electrolytes, vitamins, minerals, and nutrients lost during illness or exercise.
The effects of dehydration can last anywhere from three days to one week, depending on your health and hydration level before therapy. For more severe cases such as gastroenteritis (stomach flu), those with active vomiting and diarrhea may need a longer course of treatment ranging from 3-4 hours up to 12 hours or more depending on severity.
It is recommended that no food be consumed during treatment so that whatever your body can't rehydrate after intravenous therapy, you don't lose through vomit or bowel movements