Hot ears in children

Children usually run and jump, and it is inevitable that they will over-exercise, and the blood in their bodies begins to boil. Therefore, children's physical constitution is more active than adults, their metabolism is fast, their blood flow is also fast, and they are more likely to have fever. This is also the reason why many children are more afraid of heat in winter than normal adults. When parents touch their children's ears and find they are hot, they may consider that they have done strenuous exercise, are emotionally excited due to the low temperature in winter.

Why are my ears hot?

There are three situations when the ears are hot:

1. After strenuous exercise, your ears often feel hot. This is because when people exercise, their heart beats faster and supplies more blood to the muscles in their limbs. After physical exercise, the muscles need less blood, but the heart beat cannot slow down immediately, so more blood flows to the heart. The skin of the head and ears is very thin and filled with abundant blood vessels. When a large amount of blood flows through the ears, the blood vessels expand and become thicker, and the ears turn red. Because blood has a certain temperature, your ears will feel hot. As the heart gradually returns to normal, the blood vessels shrink and become thinner, the amount of blood on the ears decreases, and the ears no longer become hot.

2. In winter, when we return from the cold outdoors to the warm indoors, our ears become red and hot. This is because the blood vessels in the ear that contract when the temperature is low outdoors expand due to the rise in temperature indoors, and the blood flow speeds up, causing the ear to heat up.

3. Your ears may also feel hot when you are shy, have a heated argument with others, or encounter difficult questions in an exam, etc. This is because the cerebral cortex is highly excited or tense, which controls the nerves to cause the skin blood vessels to dilate, the heart rate to accelerate, and the blood flow to increase.

What to do if your ears are hot

1. Some cases can recover on their own.

If your ears become hot because you walk from the cold outdoors into a warm room, it is a natural reaction of the human body and there is no need to worry. Because the skin of the ears is covered with abundant blood vessels, when it is cold outdoors, the hands contract and the blood flow slows down. However, when you return to the room and the temperature rises, the blood vessels will expand and the blood flow will speed up, causing the ears to become red and hot.

2. Find the cause of ear heat from the source of food.

Ear fever is fundamentally caused by the dilation of subcutaneous blood vessels. So if we want to avoid frequent ear fever, we should eat less foods that can easily cause blood vessels in the ears to dilate. Common foods such as spicy foods and caffeinated coffee, cola and tea can cause blood vessels to dilate and cause ears to heat up, so they should be reduced in daily intake.

3. Control your emotions.

In addition to the effects of temperature and food, emotions can also affect body functions. For example, "red face and thick neck" is used to describe the posture of being anxious or angry, which is the emotion that causes the face to blush and become hot. In daily life, keep your emotions warm, express joy, anger, sorrow, and happiness appropriately, and do not release your emotions excessively. This will prevent your ears from getting hot for no reason.