Let me first start by saying...i have over 30 tattoos. I'm not posting this to sway you away from tattoos. Clearly, I love them and so do many. But does this make you think? Maybe! I sweat my butt off... so who knows lol.
In a new study: “Skin tattooing impairs sweating during passive whole-body heating” was published in the Journal of Applied Physiology. The study had a mission to find out if tattoos are, in fact, dangerous. Researchers discovered that skin with tattoos perspires less than ink-less skin.
“Tattooing of the skin involves repeated needle insertions to deposit ink into the dermal layer of the skin, potentially damaging eccrine sweat glands and the cutaneous vasculature,” the study states.
The study of 10 tattooed people had them wear tube-lined suits that circulate hot water as much as 120 degrees for 30 minutes or more to induce sweating. The tattooed and non-tattooed areas of skin began to sweat at the same time, which suggests that nerve signals to sweat glands were functioning correctly.
The study found that the tattood skin “has reduced sweat rates, and thus potential heat loss capacity, during whole-body heating, compared to adjacent skin without tattoos.”
“This data suggest that tattooing functionally damages secretion mechanisms, affecting the reflex capacity of the gland to produce sweat, but does not appear to affect neural signaling to initiate sweating,” the authors of the study claim. “Decreased sweating could impact heat dissipation especially when tattooing covers a higher percentage of body surface area and could be considered a potential long-term clinical side effect of tattooing.”
“The primary new finding in the current study is that peripheral [hair follicle-containing] skin of the arm containing tattoos has reduced sweat rates, and thus potential heat loss capacity, during [whole-body heating] compared to adjacent skin without tattoos,” the researchers wrote. “These data indicate that the collateral effects of the tattooing process negatively impact eccrine sweat gland function and could be considered a potential long-term complication or side effect of this cosmetic procedure,” they added.
The question is, will this study sway you to NOT get your first or additional tattys?
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