Throwing cold water on muscle growth: A systematic review with meta-analysis of the effects of postexercise cold water immersion on resistance training-induced hypertrophy

Abstract

The purpose of this paper was to systematically review the literature and perform a meta-analysis of the existing data on the effects of postexercise cold water immersion (CWI) coupled with resistance training (RT) on gains in measures of muscle growth. To locate relevant studies, we comprehensively searched the PubMed/MEDLINE, Scopus, and Web of Science databases. A total of 8 studies met the inclusion criteria; all investigated CWI as the means of cold application. Preliminary analyses conducted on noncontrolled effect sizes provided strong evidence of hypertrophic adaptations with RT that were likely to be at least small in magnitude (SMD0.5 = 0.36 [95% CrI: 0.10–0.61]; p (>0) = 0.995, p (>0.1) = 0.977). In contrast, noncontrolled effect sizes provided some evidence of hypertrophic adaptations with CWI + RT that were likely to be small to negligible in magnitude (SMD0.5 = 0.14 [95% CrI: −0.08–0.36]; p (>0) = 0.906, p (>0.1) = 0.68). The primary analysis conducted on comparative effect sizes provided some evidence of greater relative hypertrophic adaptations with RT compared to CWI + RT (cSMD0.5 = −0.22 [95% CrI: −0.47 to 0.04]) with differences likely to be greater than zero (p (<0) = 0.957) and of at least a small magnitude of effect (p ( < 0) = 0.653). In conclusion, based on the current data, the application of CWI immediately following bouts of RT may attenuate hypertrophic changes. Given the overall relatively fair to poor quality of the studies examined, the results of the current study should be interpreted with some caution.