Hot Tub Life Articles

Relieve Stress Headaches with
your Spa and Coffee!

At first glance, it does not seem that Hot Tub Spas and coffee would ever go together. One relaxes you and the other gets you going. However if you sometimes suffer from stress headaches and ibuprofen is your pain reliever of choice, you may be interested in the new research coming from the Diamond Headache Clinic in Chicago.

We all know that soaking in a Hot Tub can help to relieve tension and stress that can sometimes cause headaches. Also, a combination of caffeine and ibuprofen appears to bring faster and longer lasting relief from tension headaches than either substance alone. Although it’s well known that caffeine helps pain relievers work better, this is the first clinical study to show that caffeine alone can work as an analgesic.

Researchers gave volunteers either ibuprofen, ibuprofen and caffeine, or a dummy pill. In the first hour and a half, the group taking caffeine alone had just as much pain relief as the ibuprofen/caffeine group, indicating that initially, caffeine was responsible for the actual analgesic effect.

A number of pain medications contain caffeine, but for now, no manufacturers make an ibuprofen/caffeine combination drug. It seems that you can get the same effect by taking your ibuprofen pills while having a cup of coffee or two. Combine that with a short soak in your tub and you are healed !