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Dry Brushing, Body Scraping, Gua Sha: Lymphatic Health Is All the Rage

All of these trendy techniques center on the same concept: promoting the circulation of a colorless, watery fluid called lymph, which ferries white blood cells to and from the body’s organs and transports waste from cells and tissues to the lymph nodes, where it is filtered and fed back into the bloodstream. The sweeping movement of dry brushing — in which you’re supposed to whisk a stiff-bristled brush in small circles all over your body — and the pulses of a vibrating facial massager are supposed to gently knead out any potential blockages in lymphatic flow. Gua sha, in which you scrape a stone or metal tool along the contours of your face; body scraping, which is a full-body version of…

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"Gua" means "scraping" and "Sha," refers to the "redness" that results when one uses a tool such as a flat jade stone to "scrape" the face, Chiu said. The technique dates back millennia, with Gua Sha first used on the body to alleviate pain and to prevent fevers and other illnesses.

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