Looking for a home remedy for cough? One that is natural and perhaps easy to go down? Consider the sweet liquid from nature - pure honey.

Now, when you are down with a bout of sickness, for instance, cold, sore throat, or fever, I am sure at one point or another, you have wondered and questioned what's going on in your body, what has gone wrong and is causing those symptoms of discomfort...

An extremely common ailment which probably all of us have experienced before, cough is a vital bodily function and can be technically defined as an involuntary reflex signalled and triggered by our brain to clear a blockage or irritant (e.g phlegm, cigarette smoke, pungent gas, dust, etc) from the air passage. What is visible or audible to us when this happens is a sudden expulsion of air from the lungs that helps clear airway very quickly.

When you complain of having a cough, doctors or pharmacists often like to ask this question: is it chesty or dry? Chesty cough or productive cough is characterised by the presence of mucus or phlegm on the chest, whereas in a dry cough where the throat and upper airways are inflamed or irritated, no phlegm is produced or expelled. In some cases, a cough can be chesty but is not productive. This happens when the phlegm is not loose enough to be coughed up.

Many smokers can have a continual dry cough throughout their lives. A cough caused by a viral infection such as the flu or common cold usually disappears within two weeks; if it does not, it may be a symptom of a more serious problem and x-rays may be necessary to diagnose the problem. Persistent or chronic cough could be caused by environmental irritants or even stress (such a cough disappears while sleeping), but it could also be a sign of viral infection like bronchitis or pneumonia, whereby antibiotic medicine would be required. Signs and symptoms that point to an infection include fever, chills, body aches, sore throat, nausea, vomiting, headache, sinus pressure, runny nose, and night sweats. When cough is a warning sign of an underlying cancer of the lung or air passage, other symptoms may also be present, including worsening fatigue, loss of appetite, weight loss, or decreased ability to swallow solid or liquid foods.

Cure

Over-the-counter cough syrups for minor coughs are easily accessible. There are two primary goals in treating a cough: one is to suppress the cough reflex, especially when a cough causes pain or affects with sleep; the other is to thin the mucus, making it easier to bring up and be flushed from the body. It's beneficial to drink lots of water, warm broth, tea, and room-temperature fruit or vegetable juice to help thin and loosen the mucus.

I notice that across different cultures, home remedy for cough can vary a lot. There is obviously an interesting vast array of recipes for treating cough, but you may not be very comfortable with some of them depending a lot on the beliefs you grow up with (such as the concept of "heaty and cooling foods" which I tend to believe in). Here I would mention a few using honey, one of nature's most precious gifts:

1. Mix equal amount of honey and lemon grass juice then drink to reduce the coughs.

2. Mix a syrup consisting of 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper, 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger, 1 tablespoon honey, 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar, 2 tablespoons water, mix and drink.

3. Boil some water with 2 garlic cloves, 1 table spoon of oregano. Pour into a cup add 1 tablespoon of honey and drink.

4. Make a lemon and honey drink. Active Manuka honey and propolis have been commonly used as ingredients in the home remedy for cough because of their strong antibacterial properties.

Some researchers believe that honey, a traditional, natural home remedy for cough can offer a "safe and legitimate alternative" to dextromethorphan (DM), which can occasionally cause severe side-effects in children, including muscle contractions and spasms. A study (2007) by researchers from Penn State College of Medicine, US, involved 105 children with coughs between the ages of 2 and 18. Before bed, the children were given artificial honey-flavoured DM cough syrup, buckwheat honey or nothing at all. Results revealed that parents of children who received the honey rated their children's sleep and symptoms as better! Honey's ability as a home remedy for cough may be due to the way it soothes on contact and stimulates saliva. However, please note that honey should not be given to children under age 1 because of a rare but serious risk of botulism.

Source: http://www.benefits-of-honey.com/home-remedy-for-cough.html

R. Tan is the owner of the website http://www.benefits-of-honey.com which is a rich honey resource community specially built for all the honey lovers and fans in this world. She has packed this website with a wide range of quality contents on honey based on her knowledge and experience with honey, so as to promote its invaluable benefits which she believes could bring many positive spin-offs in everyone's daily life.

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¶ 11:58 AM 1 comments

Like acupuncture, hypnotherapy is another popular natural remedy for ISB that many people are turning to. Hypnotherapy allows a person to tap into a special mental state (the subconscious level of their mind), allowing them to alter the way in which they consciously perceive their health problems, and encourages them to respond to these problems in new ways.

How? While they are in this special mental state, the person is given verbal suggestions or provided imagery to assist them in finding relief from their symptoms. The stimulation that the person under hypnosis receives from words and images has a significant impact on the way they function mentally and physically.

For instance, imagery used during hypnotherapy for an IBS patients would be images that encourage healing. Depending on what the image is, the patient may imagine their intestines expanding and relaxing to let fluids flow through. Hence, this imagery is meant to help the patient with their constipation problem.

Why is hypnotherapy an effective IBS treatment?

The reason is because hypnosis is a therapy that can help both the body and the mind. Think of hypnosis as a treatment that helps a person put mind over matter. In other words, it�s a way to use the mind to help heal physical ailments. Furthermore, many researchers believe IBS is a primary disorder of the brain/gut axis.

The what? The brain/gut axis is the term given to the important relationship between the events that have an affect on the way the central nervous system (brain) functions, and how this resulting function affects the way the intestines function through the intestinal specialized enteric nervous system. Essentially, the mind and body are connected. The state of one�s mind can have positive or negative affects on the way the body functions.

For many IBS sufferers, one of the best benefits of hypnotherapy is its ability to reduce the hold stress has on them. Most people with IBS are plagued by negative emotions such as anxiety, tension, and depression, all symptoms of stress that are caused by having to live with an incurable condition. Stress can cause chemical imbalances within the brain that can undermine the immune system and cause an IBS flare up. Hypnosis can decrease the stress one feels about IBS and help a person realize and explore new thoughts and strategies about how to cope with the illness. Hypnotherapy turns the negative to positive.

Over the course of 15 years, numerous studies have been conducted on the effects of hypnotherapy on people with IBS. The results have been very successful. In fact, hypnotherapy regularly generates long term positive results in more than 80% of those who are treated with it. As an additional bonus, hypnotherapy is safe for all ages, and works on 90% of the population.

Keep in mind, that like most types of natural remedy for IBS, hypnotherapy usually requires more than one session to be successful and maintain its effectiveness. Furthermore, although you can learn self-hypnosis, it�s a good idea to first undergo clinical hypnosis with a qualified and licensed professional to achieve the best experience and to find out if hypnotherapy can really help you.

If you are looking for information on different types of natural remedy for IBS symptoms please visit NaturalIrritableBowelSyndromeRelief.com and sign up for a free newsletter.

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¶ 9:49 AM 0 comments