Can ice cream cause headaches? Summer solstice is here, so be careful not to overeat cold food

With the arrival of the summer solstice, the weather is getting hotter. As the saying goes, "It's not hot until the summer solstice", which means that from today on, the hot summer has officially begun. In such a hot summer, many people like to eat ice cream to cool down. The coolness and sweet taste make people feel extremely cool. But ice cream can sometimes bring people a bad experience. For example, some people will feel a headache or even dizziness after eating it. What's going on?

"Ice cream headache" is also known as "sphenopalatine ganglion neuralgia". It is caused by vascular nerve dysfunction when people are exposed to changes in temperature. According to Life Times, when people eat ice cream, their mouths suddenly become cold, causing the nerve center behind the upper palate to be overstimulated, which sends an erroneous signal to the brain, asking it to change its body temperature. At this time, the brain will rapidly contract the blood vessels in the brain; and when the oral temperature returns to normal, the blood vessels in the brain will receive instructions and rapidly expand. This rapid contraction and expansion of blood vessels can cause severe headaches in people's heads.

Yuan Xueqian, deputy director of the Yihe Hospital of Zhengzhou People's Hospital and director of the second department of neurology, told Dahe.com that "ice cream headache" often occurs in children, young people and migraine patients who like to eat cold drinks. "The headache location is often on the same side as the location stimulated by cold food, but some people have pain in the whole head. Most 'ice cream headaches' last for a short time, usually 10 to 30 seconds."

How to prevent "ice cream headache"? According to the "Health Times", Zhang Zhecheng, chief physician of the Department of Neurology at Tianjin Third Central Hospital, reminded, "Don't be too hasty when eating cold drinks, and don't swallow them directly into the back of your mouth; once you have a headache, stop eating immediately and use your hands to massage your head." If the headache does not subside after a long time, you should seek medical attention immediately. In addition, people with a history of "ice cream headache" should be more cautious when eating cold drinks. If such people often have "ice cream headache", it is easy to cause extracranial or even intracranial vascular disorders.

In addition to "ice cream headaches", excessive consumption of cold drinks and other overly cold foods can also bring other negative effects to the human body. Zhang Guoqiang, director of the emergency department of the China-Japan Friendship Hospital, told the Life Times reporter that for the elderly and people with high blood pressure, heart disease and other diseases, due to the poor self-regulation ability of blood vessels, eating overly cold food on hot days will cause the human body to not adapt to the temperature difference as quickly as possible, which will cause the blood vessels to suddenly contract when exposed to cold, leading to increased oxygen consumption in organs such as the heart and brain, as well as fluctuations in blood pressure, thus inducing angina pectoris, myocardial infarction, stroke and other symptoms, and even life-threatening in severe cases. Therefore, these people should eat a moderate temperature and not be greedy for coolness in summer.

Cold drinks and other overly cold foods can also affect the digestive system. According to Jinwanbao, excessive consumption of cold drinks and other overly cold foods can cause gastrointestinal vasoconstriction, reduce the secretion of digestive juices such as gastric acid, and thus affect digestive function; strong cold stimulation can also increase gastrointestinal motility, produce gastrointestinal spasms, and cause abdominal pain, diarrhea, vomiting and other gastrointestinal dysfunction symptoms. (Liu Yang)

This article was scientifically reviewed by Peng Guoqiu, Director of the Outpatient Department of the Bayi Building, the First Affiliated (304) Hospital of the General Hospital of the Chinese People's Liberation Army.