GUILDERLAND — Courtney Miedema, co-owner of Cryo Lodge, a new business in Guilderland, said this week that she became convinced of the therapy’s benefits through her own experience as a serious runner.

The lodge offers cryotherapy for recovery after athletic workouts, help with pain and inflammation, improved circulation and metabolism, and greater overall wellness.

The Berne-Knox-Westerlo track star went on to compete for DePaul University in Chicago, where she tried cryotherapy and felt that it was very beneficial to her regimen of running 80 miles per week.

Miedema took a part-time job during college at a cryotherapy spa, she said, so she could use the treatments. Cryotherapy helped with her pain and recovery after she tore her plantar fascia, she said, and helped her stay uninjured once she got back to 80-mile weeks. 

A native of Berne, Miedema is the daughter of Matthew Tedeschi, who was re-elected in May to the BKW School Board. She co-owns the business together with him and with her mother, Maria Tedeschi, and her sister, Allie Tedeschi, all of whom are also athletic, she said. Courtney Miedema and her sister both had college track scholarships.

Whole-body cryotherapy involves stepping into a barrel-shaped machine with sides that come up to about the top of the chest. The machine emits liquid-nitrogen vapor for three minutes. Temperatures inside the machine can fall as low as negative 160 degrees Fahrenheit, said Miedema. 

Clients wear a robe to step into the machine, along with gloves and socks that are provided to protect their extremities. They hand the robe out to the employee who stands by to “talk you through the cold,” Miedema said. 

The treatment works, she explained, because, in the extreme cold, the body goes into a fight-or-flight response. “Your body thinks something bad is going to happen, and pulls blood from the extremities to the core,” she said. 

“Healing happens when you step out. The brain shoots all the blood that was in the core back out to the extremities. The brain sends transmissions to your body to find things that happened — nothing did — so it repairs muscles, joint pain, anything not natural in your body.” 

The healing process continues for up to six hours after treatment, Miedema said. 

The first cryotherapy session is $20, she said. “After that, we have packages and memberships,” she said. Memberships are typically $139 per month, she said, although Cryo Lodge is running a deal now that gives the first 30 people to sign up a monthly fee of $99 for life. 

Cryo Lodge also offers these treatments, each 15 minutes long: 

— NormaTec recovery: This compression therapy for the legs does not involve any cold. The client puts on, over his or her clothes, a pair of pants that fills up with air and provides the equivalent of a 15-minute deep massage, helping to break up lactic-acid buildup and improving blood flow for faster muscle repair and recovery, Miedema said; 

— Cryo toning facials: This uses a localized wand that remains a consistently cool 10 to 20 degrees Fahrenheit to pull heat from the face, to produce collagen and blood flow, to reduce and remove the appearance of acne, wrinkles, redness, scars, and even skin conditions such as rosacea, according to Miedema; it also firms and tightens skin, she said, “to help bring back its youthful glow”; and 

— Localized cryotherapy: This uses the same technology as in the facial, but targets a specific area of the body that is painful or inflamed, to provide rapid healing, Miedema said. This is a 15-minute treatment that compares, she said, “to 8 hours of icing.” 

“Most clients are on a monthly membership where you get unlimited NormaTec and unlimited cryotherapy,” said Miedema. 

Their nights in particular have been busy, according to Miedema, who estimates that 95 percent of the people they have chilled once went on to become members. She said, “Most people are hooked, and they come back.” 

The business was in operation previously for three years in Park City, Utah, which is famous for skiing and which Miedema called “a very athletic culture.” Theirs was the only cryotherapy spa in town, and the business did well there, Miedema said. She and her husband, Chris Miedema, a native of Ontario, Canada — they met at DePaul — decided to move back to this area to be closer to her family. He is a teacher and coach at BKW.

“The travel back and forth was getting to be a lot,” she said. 

Cryo Lodge is in the same building within Charles Park as CrossFit Aevitas, and many clients come in after workouts, Miedema said. CrossFit members get special pricing, she added. 

Cryotherapy, which was invented in the late 1970s by a rheumatologist in Japan, is not approved by the Federal Drug Administration. It has been popular in Europe for years and more recently reached the United States. 

Dr. Robert H. Shmerling, M.D., a practicing rheumatologist, who is an associate physician and clinical chief of rheumatology at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, and an associate professor in medicine at Harvard Medical School writes in his Harvard Health Blog that the jury is still out on the efficacy of cryotherapy. 

He cites one study that found that whole-body cryotherapy may lower skin or muscle temperature to a similar (or lesser) degree than other forms of cryotherapy, such as applying ice packs; that it may reduce soreness in the short term and accelerate perception of recovery after certain activities, though this “did not consistently lead to improved function or performance”; that it may be helpful for people with the severe loss of shoulder motion known as “frozen shoulder”; and that it did not alter the amount of muscle damage (as reflected by blood tests) after intense exercise.

But, Shmerling writes, “From the available evidence, it’s hard to know if whole body cryotherapy reliably prevents or treats any particular condition, or if it speeds recovery or improves athletic performance. And even if it did, there’s little proof that it’s more helpful than much less expensive cryotherapy options, such as simply applying ice to a sore area.” 

The therapy may be contraindicated, he writes, for people with certain conditions that it may worsen: poorly controlled high blood pressure; major heart or lung disease; poor circulation (especially if made worse by exposure to cold); allergy symptoms triggered by cold; and neuropathy (nerve disease) in the legs or feet.