51–60 of 148 posts
We use both high-quality ear canal and anal thermometers, and while we have enough statistical grounds to unbias their results compared to each other, there remains significant variance. I.e. if we use an anal or ear canal thermometer makes temperature vary ±0.4 °C.
Then how sloppily you take the measurement with the same thermometer can result in a ±0.2 °C difference for the butt, and ±0.6 °C for the ear canal.
Of course, the time of day we take the temperature can give us a ±0.5 °C difference, and the activity level of the person something like a ±1 °C difference (we don't have as much data on these last ones, naturally.)
And all this is before you bring in the fever! So all of this we consider normal.
Basically, in our experience, anything below 38.4 °C could just as well be caused by any of a number of non-fever conditions at something like a 90 % confidence level, so unless there's a strong prior of fever, a "non-normal" temperature reading on its own is a fairly weak signal.
...which brings me to my final point: the prior ought to strongly affect what counts as normal temperature, but all of this discussion ignores it.
There's also the question whether you prefer false positives or false negatives when it comes to fever detection. My impression is that the medical community prefers false negatives, i.e. pretending that people with a low fever are perfectly normal -- but a lot of private persons I talk to have the opposite preference: they would prefer to think of someone as sick even though they are healthy.
Like any good medical test, you pick a threshold based on what probability you want for false positives and negatives, and you weigh the prior into this judgment. Just investigating what an average resting temperature with a particular measurement method seems to me silly.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, it's a conversion of 37C which is stupid since 37C is when I have a fever already
37 may or may not be a fever depending on your activity. If you went running your body temperature will be above 37 but you'll feel perfectly normal. When you got 37 and it's a fever it feels different.
As a side note, I hate digital contact thermometers with passion. Mercury is dangerous as hell but if it wasn't for gallium alloy ones I'd smuggle them in the country.
As the article says, Wunderlich reached a conclusion of 37C in the 1800s, and that’s what we’ve used since then. The real problem appears to be that converting to Fahrenheit and reporting this as “98.6F” suggests an order of magnitude more precision than “37C”. 36.5C would still round to 37 but corresponds to 97.7F.
I have always been taught that 37C is the upper limit, actually bordering on fever. So 36.5C or even a bit lower was always considered healthy and fine.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
To add, < 38°C (100.4°F) is not considered a fever but subfebrile.
Sometimes I feel more sick having 37.5° than 38°, I don't know why.
In Poland normal has always been considered 36.6C, which is 97.9F, which the article states as a proposed new normal.
36-36.6 is considered normal, 37 is considered a mild alteration (or life threatening disease if you're a man).
Earlier quoted context omitted.
37 may or may not be a fever depending on your activity. If you went running your body temperature will be above 37 but you'll feel perfectly normal. When you got 37 and it's a fever it feels different.
Knowing that my resting body temp was permanently 36.8-36.9 while everyone elses (on the same thermometer) was 36.6 was one of the things that led me realise something was wrong and in fact it turned out I had an autoimmune. Of course the temperature fluctuates with activity and with the time of the day but an auxiliary reading of 36.6 has been what I've always observed for myself and others. After all we all run the…
It's elemental mercury encapsulated in glass not one of the organic compounds that cause all the acute and longterm health issues. Chlorine bleach is scarier stuff used in the household.
It’s not mentioned in the article, which I find odd, because it tells you something about averaging statistics and male body bias in science.
The whole enterprise of trying to find "a normal" temperature seems silly to me, increasingly after getting two kids with fevers every now and then. We use both high-quality ear canal and anal thermometers, and while we have enough statistical grounds to unbias their results compared to each other, there remains significant variance. I.e. if we use an anal or ear canal thermometer makes temperature vary ±0.4 °C. Then…
This part is just known, though: the usual "close enough" standard for core temperature is an anal temperature and everything else you have to adjust. (Everything else you say I agree with, though.)
The whole enterprise of trying to find "a normal" temperature seems silly to me, increasingly after getting two kids with fevers every now and then. We use both high-quality ear canal and anal thermometers, and while we have enough statistical grounds to unbias their results compared to each other, there remains significant variance. I.e. if we use an anal or ear canal thermometer makes temperature vary ±0.4 °C. Then…