The effect of various cold-water immersion protocols on exercise-induced inflammatory response and functional recovery from high-intensity sprint exercise
Gillian E. White, S. Rhind, G. Wells · 2014 · European Journal of Applied Physiology
This randomised crossover trial compared five post-exercise recovery conditions, including cold-water immersion protocols, after high-intensity intermittent sprinting, examining inflammatory response and functional recovery. The extracted methods evidence confirms only that conditions were assigned in random order; it provides nothing on allocation concealment, sample size analysed, attrition, outcome assessment, or pre-specified analyses, so most domains cannot be settled. Unblindable immersion interventions also leave effort-dependent functional outcomes vulnerable to expectation effects.
What was extracted
| Design | Not reported |
| Participants | not reported |
| Population | Not reported |
| Outcome measured | Not reported |
| Funding | Not reported |
| Read from | full-text |
| DOI | 10.1007/s00421-014-2954-2 |
Risk of bias
Assessed with RoB 2, the instrument for this design, from the full-text. Overall: Some concerns.
| Domain | Judgment | Reason given |
|---|---|---|
| Randomisation process | Some concerns | The paper states a randomized crossover design with recovery conditions "assigned in a random order," but the extracted evidence gives no detail on sequence generation method or allocation concealment, and no baseline/period comparability data. |
| Deviations from interventions | No information | Nothing in the extracted evidence addresses blinding of participants or personnel, adherence to the assigned immersion protocols, co-interventions between the weekly testing sessions, or the analysis population. |
| Missing data | No information | Neither the number of participants analysed nor any dropout/withdrawal or missing-session accounting is reported in the extracted evidence. |
| Measurement of outcomes | Some concerns | No outcome measurement or assessor-blinding information was extracted, and cold-water immersion cannot be blinded to participants, which matters for any effort-dependent functional recovery measures even if inflammatory markers are assayed objectively. |
| Selection of the reported result | No information | No pre-registration, protocol, or pre-specified analysis plan is mentioned in the extracted evidence, and the study involves multiple inflammatory markers, functional tests and time points. |
Assessed by claude-opus-5 · self-reported confidence 0.62 · standard v2. Not verified by a human reviewer.