Cold And Flu Action

Cold and Flu: Prevention and Cure

Every year, millions and millions of cold viruses are caught in Australia alone. This year has been a really bad one. I got hit a few more times than I wanted to which led me to researching, just how do you avoid colds and what do you do just on the onset to get rid of one?

Colds are annoying, I hate them. They cost us time, money and we end up feeling miserable for days to weeks!

First, let’s get one thing straight. Colds are viruses, not bacteria, so antibiotics are of no use unless you have a secondary infection that goes into your chest causing bronchitis or pneumonia. But let’s stop that cold before it gets to that stage. Even better, let’s avoid getting one at all.

How Do You Catch a Cold?

Hand to hand contact with someone that coughs in their hand. This is the main one. Then you stick your hand in your mouth, ears and nose etc. So many objects that we touch every day will be infected and spread by infected carriers. Surfaces like keyboards, door handles, pens etc.

Now if your immune system is functioning OK, there shouldn’t be a problem knocking this virus out. It’s when we eat the wrong foods, get stressed, don’t wear enough clothes and lack sleep that our defences drop and we get SICK.

A few things that make your body susceptible to cold and flu are:

1.    Eating too much sugar

2.    Not wearing enough clothing and keeping our of the cold and wind

3.    Letting stress get on top of you

4.    Vitamin D deficiency

5.    Not getting adequate sleep during the dark part of the day

6.    Wash your hands!

How Long Do Colds Last … and How to Get Rid Of Them Quicker Or Avoid Them All Together?

The majority of colds, maybe 70-80% last around a week. 10-15% maybe 2 weeks, and a small amount over two weeks, usually in imuno-compromised patients, smokers or if there’s a really stubborn virus going around.

How long the cold lasts is often a combination in strengths/weaknesses of the above 6 points.

Diet And Eating Too Much Sugar

One point I like to stress is digestion. Most of our immune system is produced in the lining of our intestines. It is of utmost importance that you have a good functioning gut so that you can 1. Absorb nutrients properly from your food and 2. Produce adequate immune responses to pathogens such as bacterial and viral invasion. Digestion is something I personally love treating because it took me years to work it out as I had my own problems for years. Now it’s easy for me and I get great joy seeing people well with a healthy regular digestive system.

Sugar is a well-known immune suppressant. It can destroy the germ killing power of white blood cells for up to 5 hours after ingestion. It can reduce the production of anti-bodies, which are the cells in charge of attaching to and inactivating foreign cells and pathogens in the body. It will neutralize the action of EFA’s (essential fatty acids) and even interfere with the transport of vitamin C.

Hint: Stay off the refined sugary foods and sweetened drinks for a while if you think you’re getting run down.

Hydrogen Peroxide: Really?

This is a bit of a weird one and something I only just came across this month. I tried it, I’m not totally sold but- it’s an interesting theory…some people swear by it.

It started in 1928 with a doctor named Richard Simmons who theorised that catching a cold started in the ear canal then spread to the rest of the body. The cure? Hydrogen peroxide 3% dropped into the ears to cleanse. Then in 1939 research was conducted in Germany with some success.

What to do? As long as you catch the cold at the onset up to 12 hours this is meant to work. Buy 3% hydrogen peroxide from the chemist for a couple of bucks. Place about 3 drops of liquid into your ear canal while lying on your side. It will start to bubble and pop for about 5 minutes. Drain out the liquid then try the other ear. If anything it’s very effective at cleaning the wax out of your ears. My local chemist said she commonly sells it to divers and swimmers who get ear infections and wax build up. 

As long as you use the 3% it’s safe. It’s the other strong ones used for bleaching your hair you don’t want. If you have questions or concerns it’s best to talk to your chemist or doctor.

So What Else Can You Do to Recover From the Onset of a Cold?

Well, if the old peroxide doesn’t work and you start getting that itchy throat there is a Chinese medicine home remedy.

CONGEE!!!

Yes, the one I keep hammering to you in the clinic! Congee rules!

So, you need hot rice congee, fresh spring onion, ginger, lots of lemon and fish sauce. Eat a big bowl, put on a few layers of clothes and sweat it out in bed. I don’t recommend this method of sweating so much in people over 60 or with a heart condition. But if you’re young and otherwise pretty healthy, it does work pretty well usually.

Not sure how to make congee?? Well, check out my video then!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zjwt_kEt4eM&feature=mh_lolz&list=FL-M_IDPYvAQ8

Dietary Strategies to Kick a Cold

If you do end up getting a cold, the best thing is to rest, take lots of fluids, dose up on zinc, vitamin c and chicken soup/congee.

Also, avoid sugar and sweeties!

When you get that feeling of ‘oh, I don’t feel well’, it’s time to go through the health check list. 1. Check your sugar- cut it out 2. Rug up. Wear thermals and ear muffs etc. 3. Check your stress. Meditate or relax as much as you can. Take a bath 4. Make sure you’re getting enough sun light or take a supplement 5. Go to bed early. 6. Wash your hands often

Diet wise, make some good food choices:

·         Good clean food, no take away. Prebiotic rich food to help your digestion such as kefir, miso, kimchi, garlic.

·         Home-made chicken soup

·         Coconut water

·         Locally grown fruits and vegetables

·         Mushrooms, especially Reishi, Shiitake, and Maitake,

·         Congee

·         Green leafy veggies

·         Lots of fresh water

·         Not too much phlegmy foods like milk, cheese and yoghurt

Supplements to Get You Through or Prevent the Worst

·         Vitamin C: A very potent antioxidant

·         Vitamin D: Vey important immune mediator

·         Zinc: Also very important for the immune system

·         Dry Cough Tincture: Made by us at the clinic now in a convenient tincture. A thousand year old Chinese medical formula amazing for that persistent dry cough.

·         Dry cough syrup: Pi Pa Gao. Famous old Chinese medicine syrup used to soothe the throat

·         Olive leaf extract: High in antioxidants and used for thousands of years in different cultures.

·         Gan Mao Ling: Chinese medicine tablets. Great for cold and flu prevention.

Remember This Tip: Wash Your Hands Often, but not Too Often

Hand washing is a really practical method of infection control. Note that your hands do have a natural anti-bacterial coat so you don’t want to be obsessively washing hundreds of times a day unless you work in a hospital.

What If I’m One Of Those People Where The Cold Always Goes Into My Lungs?

One good tip I’d like to leave you with is this. If you have followed all the above advice and you have a snotty nose that runs down the back of your throat, you want to clear this especially it that snot turns green or yellow. It will likely then run down into your lungs and festers in there. Get a netti pot or nasal irrigation pump and regularly clear out your nose morning and night. This will significantly reduce the likelihood of the cold progressing to a chest infection.

 Note:

I hope you have all enjoyed this information and it helps you out some day. Please use it with common sense and always contact your doctor if you get a high fever, symptoms become severe or you feel worried in any way about your health and safety.

Launching Herb Lab Chinese Medical Tinctures and Supplements

how to boil chinese herbs

Dampness and Phlegm: Physics and Diet

Internal Dampness & Phlegm

Dampness and phlegm are accumulations that occur in the body that may make us feel ‘phlegmy’ or just heavy and tired. When our diet is out of sync with our body, our mind is working overtime, or when the weather is very damp and humid, we tend to become stagnant with damp and phlegm.

Dampness is generally considered a thicker/heavier viscosity than phlegm, however may be less obvious in physical signs. Dampness is sensed in the heaviness of the body and fogginess of thinking, and can be seen in the tongue coat.

Phlegm is thinner and manifests in a runny nose or wet type of cough.

Symptoms of Dampness & Phlegm

·         Foggy head

·         Poor memory

·         Difficulty waking up in the morning

·         Low energy, especially after eating

·         Loose Stool

·         Poor concentration

·         Leucorrhoea

·         Wet-pustulent skin conditions

Signs of Dampness & Phlegm

·         Swollen tongue with teeth marks

·         White coating on tongue

·         Runny nose, especially after greasy/dairy food

·         Slippery pulse

One of the signs of dampness is a thick tongue coating and swelling of the tongue body. Sometimes the coating of the tongue is very thick and white, especially in people that consume a lot of dairy such as yoghurt and milk. These people often also scrape the coating of their tongue as it is so thick! This doesn’t treat the root of the damp problem, just removes one of the indicators.

Damp and phlegm accumulate for a few different reasons. We can initially break the causes down into 2 categories: Internal and External routes.

Internally damp/phlegm may accumulate due to:

1.    Overthinking/stress leading to a deficiency of the spleen qi (digestive energy) which can’t cope with all the damp  foods being ingested, thus leading to a sluggish digestion.

2.    Poor diet. Too much dairy, greasy, oily, fatty, sweet, cold, raw and rich natured foods.

Externally damp/phlegm may accumulate due to:

1.    Humid environment. Tropical weather. Air-conditioner blasting on you during a hot day for long periods of time.

2.    The two weeks between each season change, and especially the end of summer which is considered the ‘late summer’ or ‘damp’ time of the year when we expect dampness to accumulate.

Chinese medicine is based on the 5 element theory.  Fire, Earth, Metal, Water and Wood.

Each element relates to a season, organ, emotion and function etc. Dampness relates most closely to earth. The earth element relates to late summer, and the organs of the spleen and stomach.

The job of the spleen and stomach is to convert food and water to energy and the rest to waste. However, sometimes when this system is run-down and can’t convert things properly, due to a rich diet for example, there is an excess residue left over that can’t be disposed of efficiently called dampness. Chinese medicine also states that when the dampness over flows from the earth element, it is contained in the metal element; this being the lungs and large intestine. This can explain why sometimes we eat greasy fish and chips or a milk shake and get a runny nose, cough or diarrhoea.

Dampness is heavy and likes to drain down and out. Sometimes it can’t do this as it gets blocked and gluggy. There are a few ways we get rid of damp. First we want to reduce the foods that are adding to the problem. Then we want to use herbs and acupuncture to either open the pores of the skin to disperse through sweat, purge through the stool or drain through urination. Then we will strengthen the digestion using a bland diet, exercise, herbs and acupuncture.

Matter and Energy 
A good way to explain Chinese medicine and what we call ‘digestive fire’ is through basic physics principles.

Matter and energy. The two fundamental aspects of nature are fire and water. We can refer to these 2 elements as matter (water) and energy (fire). Everything is a form of matter and energy, matter being a more condensed form with less vibration and energy as a more dispersed and insubstantial form that has highly vibrational electrons and protons.

This said, the two are interchangeable; life and nature are always moving and changing. We are made up of matter and we are driven by passion, emotion, will and love, in this case we can say this is the ‘energy’ or fire that is life. Thus, we are made up of matter, driven by energy. But what fuels this energy? Food, air and water. So we have life, or this ‘inner fire’, and we want to add fuel or wood. What kind of wood would we add to a campfire?

What burdens the digestive fire?

When we want to make a good fire, we need good, light and dry wood; like kindling. We notice when we put green sticks on the fire it smokes and dulls the fire. Likewise, if we put a large log of wet wood on the fire, we’re likely to extinguish it totally.

The spleen and stomach like dry, light food. Thus heavy, oily, greasy, raw and dense foods are not the kind of thing to strengthen an already weak digestion. It is like throwing a big heavy wet log on a small fire. Goodbye fire!

We need to start with easily digestible grains and foods that are cooked well and not overly processed. This is our kindling.

Foods to reduce dampness & return digestive fire

Cooked whole grains: Rice, Oats, Barley, Rye, Millet, Quinoa, Pearl Barley, Buckwheat, Amaranth, Corn

Veggies: Beans (if you can tolerate from the gas), celery, pumpkin, turnip, alfalfa, leafy greens

Meat/Protein: Small amounts of well cooked (even slow cooked/stewed) are good and damp draining. Beef, Lamb, Chicken.

Spices/Herbs: Ginger is great to warm the digestive fire, especially in congee. Cardamom, cinnamon, fennel, paprika, cumin and pepper are all warming to the digestion.

Foods to avoid that increase dampness & reduce digestive fire

Basically, too much raw, cold, sweet, oily or mucous-forming foods.

Too many raw fruits, vegetable, sprouts, juices, cold food from the fridge, salad, sushi in excess.

Late night eating

Over eating

Not chewing properly

Processed foods such as pastries, pork, duck, salads, wheat grass, avocados, bananas, tofu, soy milk (soy is 50% fats and oils), eggs, chocolate, ice cream, smoothies, iced water, lassies, dairy.

A raw food or salad diet sounds great and cleansing but may not be beneficial for everyone. A person who is very hot, red faced with a strong constitution will benefit a lot, however a skinny, pale, tired person will become worse. This is all due to their condition, digestive fire, and diet.

Further improving digestion and reducing excess weight

When the digestive fire is reduced and we put in more of the wrong foods, we get a left over residue. This is what we call dampness. This dampness is energy that has become more substantial, matter. This left over matter may be deposited as fat or turn into more solid matter such as cysts.

The way to reduce this occurring is:

Reducing damp accumulating foods

Restoring digestive fire

Become active and exercise daily

Clearing your mind with meditation and relaxation breathing

Chris Eddy Dr of Chinese Medicine

Centuries-Old Chinese Medicine Stops Formation Of Cysts In Polycystic Kidney Disease

Centuries-Old Chinese Medicine Stops Formation Of Cysts In Polycystic Kidney Disease

ICV for you and me

Headache, Bad breath, face pallor, Dark circles under eyes, Dizziness, Bowel disturbances (diarrhea / constipation), Right shoulder and hip pain?

If you have a few of these conditions you may have kidney Yang deficiency...then again, you may also have a dysfunction of the Ilio-cecal Valve. 

The Ileocecal valve (ICV) is located in the digestive tract in between the small intestine and the large intestine. The ICV opens and closes periodically to let food travel through the digestive tract. When it is closed, food sits in the small intestine where nutrients, vitamins and minerals are absorbed. When small intestine is done with that portion of food the ICV opens and lets it go into the large intestine where water is absorbed. The food that is in the large intestine has considerably more toxins in it than the food in the small intestine because of the amount of digestion and breakdown that has taken place over time. In the large intestine the digested food is prepared to be excreted out of the body through the rectum. 

When the ICV is not functioning properly, either stuck closed or stuck open, there is an imbalance in the digestive system which leads to many problems in the body.

The autonomic nerous system tone also affects the ICV. If you are too tense or sympathetic dominant the ICV will tend to be closed more often. If the nervous system is too relaxed, parasympathetic dominant, then the ICV will tend to become stuck open.

The ICV is effected by diet, emotions and dehydration. It is treated by massage and acupuncture, consolidated by diet and herbal supplements.

Sloppy Poos

Smelly farts and sloppy poos? Discomfort 5-30 minutes after eating sweeties? Cut out wheat, fructose, lactose and still having problems? Could be anaerobic bacteria living in the upper part of the small intestine. These organisms live on sugar, not oxygen. Any time you eat something other than an animal product, a fat, oil or butter, meaning that you would be eating carbohydrates that all break down into sugar, these organisms love you and repay you for your kindness feeding them with discomfort, burping, pain, gas and bloating. Could be time for some Chinese Medicine.