A study by Stanford University scientists questioned the established medical standard - the average body temperature of 36.6°C. Their work shows that body temperature in healthy people ranges from 36.2°C to 38.8°C, rendering the traditional value obsolete.
How and why the average temperature changes
The results of the study showed that the average temperature of the human body has decreased by 0.5°C over the past two centuries. Scientists explain this by the improvement of living conditions, medicine, hygiene and general health of the population.
Dr. Julie Parsonnet, an infectious disease expert, noted:
"Physiologically, we have become different than we were in the 19th century."
The change in mean temperature is of great practical importance, especially for the diagnosis of fever and other conditions. The new information may affect the revision of medical protocols, as the idea of a "normal" temperature is now more dependent on the individual characteristics of a person.
Scientists analyzed more than 618,000 temperature measurements collected between 2008 and 2017. For accuracy, they excluded data that could be influenced by diseases and applied modern algorithms.
In addition, the research team reviewed trends in body temperature changes over the past 200 years, comparing modern data with those collected in the 19th century.
This discovery has important implications for medicine. Instead of one "average" temperature, doctors will have to take more into account the individual fluctuations of patients. For modern diagnostics, this means that the concepts of "fever" or "normal temperature" should now be evaluated more flexibly.
Knowing about the real range of body temperature changes the perception of human health. In the future, basic diagnostic standards or even household habits such as regular temperature measurement may have to be changed.
This discovery once again reminds us that even established "axioms" can change when science gives us new knowledge.
