University:
The Pennsylvania State University
Course:
NURS 100 | Nursing
Academic year:

2024
Views:

186

Pages:

2
Author:

Aaron B.

WARM COMPRESS UNDERSTANDING Aincrease warm compress is a and pieceheat of gauze moistened with a programmed warm liquid. Heat can& vasodilation evaporation from the skin surface. According to Smeltzer Bare (2002) warmtocompresses have the advantage of increasing blood flow to anused areainand possibly helping reduce pain by speeding up healing. The water temperature warm compresses is 50-60°C OBJECTIVE The purpose of apain, warmandcompress isblood to soften fibrous tissue,calm maketothe body's muscles more relaxed, reduce improve flow and provide the client. The warm compress stiffness used functions to dilate blood vessels, stimulate blood circulation, and reduce PHYSIOLOGY OF WARM COMPRESSES Smeltzer Bare (2002), stated that heat energy is lost orradiation. enters the body through the skin in four ways,&namely conduction, convection, evaporation Conduction Conduction is the the heat transfer ofprocess heat due to direct exposure ofmechanism the skin toisobjects around the body. Usually loss using the conduction very small. Touch with objects generally resultstoinbea small lossexposed of temperature dueis relatively to two mechanisms, namely the body's tendency directly to objects muchtransfer smaller than exposure to air, and the insulating nature of objects means that the heat process cannot occur effectively continuously. Convection Convection isremoved heat transfer basedononthe fluidairmovement, inthethishuman case air, meaning that body heat can be depending flow across body. Convection is the transfer of heat energy by air or water currents. When thewith bodytheloses heat through conduction with cooler surrounding air,air,thetheairhotin air contact skin becomes warm. Because hot air is lighter than cold displaces whenconvection, the cold airhelps movescarry to theheat skinaway to replace thebody. hot air. This air movement is called current. from the The combination of convection and conduction processes to carry away heat from thefan,body is movement assisted bywhen the forced movement of air across the surface of the body such as a body riding a bicycle, etc. Radiation Radiation is a mechanism for losing body heat in the formmicrometers. of infrared heat waves. Infrared waves emitted from the body have a wavelength of 5‒20 The human body emits heat waves in all corners of the body. Radiation is the greatest heat loss mechanism inmovement. the skin, 60% orof15% of all heat lossmovement mechanisms. Heat is the kinetic energy ofthemolecular Most the energy in this can be transferred to the air if air the temperature is cooler than the skin. Once the air temperature comes into contact with skin, theofairairtemperature becomesso the andisnocooler morethan gas body exchange occurs, only the process movement occurs thatsame new air temperature. Evaporation Evaporation (evaporation of water from the skin) can facilitate body heat transfer. Every In gram of water that experiences evaporation will cause body heat loss of 0.58 kilocalories. the condition thatml/day. an individual doescontinuous not sweat, heat the evaporation mechanism takes place around 450-600 This causes loss at a rate of 12-16 calories per hour. This evaporation cannot be controlled because evaporation occurs due to continuous diffusion of water molecules through the skin and respiratory system.