The "More Medical Theory Down The Drain!" Story

It was an ordinary day.  Sitting in my family doctor's office waiting for the doctor to enter.  The nurse had just taken my vitals and when I asked her to share them with me she did so.  My body temperature was 97.2 and I asked her if she thought something was wrong with me.  She told me that body temperature changes from time to time as well as from one patient to another.  If it had been below another degree or two lower, the doctor would have been concerned.  Have you ever heard of that before...that normal body temperature isn't 98.6 anymore?  Seems if you are a woman, may be old like me, may be late afternoon and maybe overweight, your body temperature may be different than a young, skinny man who came into the office at 8:00 am. The 98.6 number was established in 1851 by German physician Carl Reinhold August Wunderlich.  And now I find out that normal body temperature has dropped about 0.05 degrees Fahrenheit each decade, based on a person's birth year.  Dr. Julie Parsonnet commented that there's never been an official real number since people vary so much.  Did you know that?  But, why is our overall body temperature doing down?  

I found out that body temperature of men born in the 2000s is about 1.06 degrees Fahrenheit lower than men born in the early 1800s.  And, the body temperature of women born in the 2000s is on average 0.58 degrees Fahrenheit lower than women born in the 1890s.  Could it be that people are taller and heavier now and their metabolic rates have slowed?  Could it also be that eliminating certain diseases such as tuberculosis, periodontal diseases and syphilis could affect you body temperature?  When your body has to fight disease your body temperature rises.  Seems we are not only facing global warming, but human cooling.  What should we do?  My doctor told me that my body temperature wouldn't affect how he would treat me for what he might suspect I have.  Told me that I shouldn't worry about my temperature.  I did read that doctors usually don't worry about body temperature unless you temperature is about 100, which indicated a fever, or below 94, which indicates hypothermia.  Also could be that every person has their own personal average body temperature and it's probably best to see the same doctor each visit since they will be able to compare your own personal body temperature on each visit.  Now, I'm trying to figure how I can get my body temperature to be on the low side so he will prescribe a trip to a warm area of the world with a beach that has warm water.  Maybe a few ice cubes in my mouth before I enter his office.  But, then again, I have to hope the nurse will take my body temperature with a thermometer in my mouth and not a device that checks it at the temple.  That's going to be my next assignment...how to lower my body temperature at my temple.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.