Though many people relish the heat, there are some things that we need to remember in order to look after ourselves. Read up here in our Tel Aviv Doctor Health Blog on Dehydration (below), Heat Exhaustion and Heat Stroke in post 2, and Tips on Remaining Well in the Heat in post 3 of this 3-post Summer-Heat-series.

It’s easy to see why we sometimes don’t realize how much heat and sun we have been exposed to; we can easily get carried away in the excitement of prospects of the amazing things we can do outdoors when the weather warms up. The next thing we know, we have come home and we have an awful headache, feel sick and dizzy and we wonder … what happened?

Health Risks: Dehydration

Symptoms like feeling dizzy on standing, nauseous and suffering from headaches can often be attributed to dehydration. Simple dehydration occurs when there is an imbalance between the losses of fluid made (mainly in hot weather through sweating, but also through urination) and the intake we put in (through fluids, but to a lesser extent through water containing foods such as fruit and vegetables).

Dehydration can produce symptoms that are wide ranging and they depend on the severity, but general fatigue and lassitude, weakness and thirst are common early symptoms. More severe dehydration usually produces more profound symptoms and signs such as high pulse rate, reduced level of consciousness, markedly reduced urine production (or indeed failure to produce urine). This level of dehydration is an emergency and requires urgent medical attention.

Despite the fact that a lot of us know to drink more in hot weather, we can’t always tell how much fluid we are still continually losing through sweat, and sweating we will do a lot of here in the high humidity of Tel Aviv.

There’s nothing you can do- and should do- about this. Sweating is a natural mechanism through which the body uses to cool itself when our core body temperature rises and is there to protect us, even if it is somewhat socially inconvenient at times.

Failure of the body to regulate the core body temperature has serious effects, potentially leading to the conditions you may of heard of known as ‘heat exhaustion’ or, in more severe cases, ‘heat stroke.’ These are two serious conditions, which if not promptly recognised and treated quickly can be extremely dangerous, potentially fatal in the case of heat stroke.

Heat Exhaustion, Heat Stroke …

Read up on the symptoms and tips for treatment of Heat Exhaustion and Heat Stroke in our second of three posts about Summer Heat Health Risks in Israel >>