WHAT IS EXACTLY FOMENTATION??? AND HOW DOES SPECIFIC HEAT CAPACITY DEPEND ON MASS? 

 

Fomentation is the application of hot packs to reduce the pain in body parts. By fomentation, patients suffering from pain get relief by maintaining the swollen body parts of patients at a moderate temperature, around 50 °C. Hot water is used for fomentation as it can store a large amount of heat energy at low temperature due to its high specific heat.

 

Specific heat capacity:

Heat capacity of a body when expressed for unit mass is called its specific heat capacity. It is denoted by the symbol c. Thus the specific heat capacity of a substance (or a body) is defined as the heat capacity per unit mass of that body, that is 

 

The specific heat capacity of a substance is the amount of heat energy required to raise the temperature of unit mass of that substance through 1°C (or 1 K). 

Thus, it does not depend on the mass of the body but is the characteristic property of the substance of the body.