Hypothermia has been applied therapeutically since antiquity. The Greek physician Hippocrates, the namesake of the Hippocratic Oath, advocated the packing of wounded soldiers in snow and ice. Napoleonic surgeon Baron Dominique Jean Larrey recorded that officers who were kept closer to the fire survived less often than the minimally pampered infantrymen. In modern times, the first medical article concerning hypothermia was published in 1945. This study focused on the effects of hypothermia on patients with severe head injury. In the 1950s, hypothermia received its first medical application, being used in intracerebral aneurysm surgery to create a bloodless field. Most of the early research focused on the applications of deep hypothermia, defined as a body temperature of . Such an extreme drop in body temperature brings with it a whole host of side effects, which made the use of deep hypothermia impractical in most clinical situations.
This period also saw sporadic investigation of more mild forms of hypothermia, with mild hypothermia being defined as a body temperature of . In the 1950s, Doctor Rosomoff demonstrated in dogs the positive effects of mild hypothermia after brain ischemia and traumatic brain injury. In the 1980s further animal studies indicated the ability of mild hypothermia to act as a general neuroprotectant following a blockage of blood flow to the brain.  This animal data was supported by two landmark human studies that were published simultaneously in 2002 by the New England Journal of Medicine. Both studies, one occurring in Europe and the other in Australia, demonstrated the positive effects of mild hypothermia applied following cardiac arrest. Responding to this research, in 2003 the American Heart Association (AHA) and the International Liaison Committee on Resuscitation (ILCOR) endorsed the use of targeted temperature management following cardiac arrest. Currently, a growing percentage of hospitals around the world incorporate the AHA/ILCOR guidelines and include hypothermic therapies in their standard package of care for patients with cardiac arrest. Some researchers go so far as to contend that hypothermia represents a better neuroprotectant following a blockage of blood to the brain than any known drug. Over this same period a particularly successful research effort showed that hypothermia is a highly effective treatment when applied to newborn infants following birth asphyxia. Meta-analysis of a number of large randomised controlled trials showed that hypothermia for 72 hours started within 6 hours of birth significantly increased the chance of survival without brain damage.