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May 11, 2018 · A. The best evidence suggests that there is neither harm nor benefit to treating a fever with fever-reducing medications like acetaminophen or ibuprofen. Hundreds of millions of years ago, animals ...
Nov 23, 2020 · Blocking fever can be harmful because fever, along with other sickness symptoms, evolved as a defense against infection. Fever works by causing more damage to pathogens and infected cells than it does to healthy cells in the body.
- Sylwia Wrotek, Edmund K LeGrand, Artur Dzialuk, Joe Alcock
- 2021
Sep 11, 2023 · The standard view that the heat of fever kills pathogens and enhances immune responses is correct but incomplete. Fever’s ability to control infections comes from the few extra, but critical ...
Nov 23, 2020 · Fever, the regulated increase in the body temperature, is part of the evolved systemic reaction to infection known as the acute phase response. The heat of fever augments the performance of immune cells, induces stress on pathogens and infected cells directly, and combines with other stressors to provide a nonspecific immune defense.
- Sylwia Wrotek, Edmund K LeGrand, Artur Dzialuk, Joe Alcock
- 2021
- Overview
- A temperature-sensitive signaling pathway
- The protein that alters temperature reactivity
Researchers claim that fevers are more than just a symptom of illness or infection. They found that elevated body temperature sets in motion a series of mechanisms that regulate our immune system.
When we are healthy, our body temperature tends to gravitate around 37°C (98.6°F).
But when faced with an infection or virus, body temperature often goes up, resulting in a fever.
When someone’s body temperature rises to about 38°C (100.4°F0, doctors classify it as a slight fever. Larger increases in body temperature to around 39.5°C (103.1°F) count as a high fever.
When a person has the flu, for instance, they may experience a mild and uncomfortable fever. This may drive many people to seek natural or over-the-counter remedies to treat it.
However, fevers are not always a bad sign. Mild fevers are a good indication that the immune system is doing its job. But fevers are not just a byproduct of the immune response.
A signaling pathway called Nuclear Factor kappa B (NF-κB) plays an important role in the body’s inflammation response in the context of infection or disease.
NF-κB are proteins that help to regulate gene expression and the production of certain immune cells.
These proteins respond to the presence of viral or bacterial molecules in the system, and that is when they start switching relevant genes related to the immune response on and off at cellular level.
Dysregulated NF-κB activity has been linked with the presence of autoimmune diseases, such as psoriasis, irritable bowel diseases, and rheumatoid arthritis.
The researchers note that NF-κB activity tends to slow down the lower the body temperature. But when the body temperature is elevated over 37°C (98.6°F), it tends to become more intense.
Why does this happen? The answer, they hypothesized, might be found by looking at a protein known as A20, encoded by the gene with the same name.
The researchers involved in the study wondered whether blocking the expression of the A20 gene would affect the way in which NF-κB functioned.
And, sure enough, they found that in the absence of the A20 protein, NF-κB activity no longer reacted to changes in body temperature, and its activity therefore no longer increased in case of a fever.
These findings might also be relevant to the normal fluctuations in temperature that our bodies undergo every day, and how these may affect our response to pathogens.
As Prof. Rand explains, our body clock regulates our internal temperature and determines mild fluctuations — of about 1.15°C at a time — during wakefulness and sleep.
So, he says, “[T]he lower body temperature during sleep might provide a fascinating explanation into how shift work, jet lag, or sleep disorders cause increased inflammatory disease.”
Although many genes whose expression is regulated by NF-κB were not temperature-sensitive, the researchers found that certain genes — which played a key role in the regulation of inflammation and which impacted cell communication — did, in fact, respond differently to different temperatures.
Dec 5, 2023 · Some people should avoid heat therapy because of a heart condition, pregnancy, epilepsy, severe blood pressure problems or difficulty with balance. When in doubt, consult a physician. As in all things, moderation and common sense should be followed. A mild to moderate fever may be helpful for many people without severe illness.
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Jan 31, 2024 · They're the hallmarks of cold and flu season: a sore throat, a blocked nose and, sometimes, a dreaded fever. You may have heard that the warmth of a fever helps the body recover from illness.
