Hypothermia Research Paper

Hypothermia is a medical emergency that occurs when your body loses heat faster than it can produce heat that then causes a dangerously low body temperature.

Hypothermia happens when your body temperature drops way below normal, causing to circulatory, respiratory and nervous systems to slow down. Normal body temperature is around 37 degrees Celsius hypothermia happens if your temperature drops to 35 degrees Celsius or below.

Hypothermia is the cause of 1500 deaths a year in the US. It is more common in older people and males.

Some symptoms;

Shivering, although as hypothermia worsens, shivering stops.

Clumsiness or lack of coordination.

Slurred speech or mumbling.

Confusion and poor decision making such as trying to remove warm clothes.

This area is normally inhibited by signals from the heart centre in the anterior hypothermic-preoptic area but is excited by cold signals from the skin and spinal cord. Therefore, this centre becomes activated when the body falls even a fraction of degree below a critical temperature level.

Clumsiness and lack of coordination is mostly caused by elevated stress or abnormal amounts of stress, the nervous systems is mostly affected by clumsiness and lack of coordination.

Loss of consciousness is due to temporary reduction in blood flow and therefore a shortage of oxygen to the brain.

Colder the weather the less your heart, nervous system and other organs work. Hypothermia can lead to heart and respiratory system failure and death.

The final stage is profound hypothermia, in this stage the body has effectively stopped trying to keep itself warm and some final steps are taken to avoid death. The heart rate and breathing slow so that they are hard to detect at all. Only one or two breaths per minuet may be taken. The skin is very pale and icy cold to the touch. The limbs are stiff, the pupils of the eyes dilate (open wide) and don’t react to light. To all intents and purpose the person appears to be dead. Metabolism has slowed so far that they are almost in a state of