You could go through the roughly 200 million home remedies posted on the web and try each one individually to see if it works, or your could just keep reading. The choice is yours.
Here are a few cures for what ails you that are totally legit:
1. Chicken soup actually does help with colds.
It’s not a cure-all (nothing is, except for your immune system, and that takes time), but hot chicken soup can help you get through that awful stuffed-up, can’t-breathe portion of a head cold.
Keri Peterson is a primary care doctor at Mount Sinai Medical Center, and she explained how this works to CBS News, presumably because they asked her. “All liquid broth soups will speed up the movement of mucous in your nose simply because it’s a hot fluid and that causes dilation of blood vessels which causes increased blood flow and allows the mucus to flush everything out,” Peterson said. “And that will help alleviate congestion.”
2. Duct tape really does get rid of warts.
You don’t need to go have your warts frozen off at the doctor’s office. Just slap a little duct tape on there and let it do its magic.
A 2002 study from the journal Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine compared duct tape with the most common medical intervention for warts, cryotherapy, which entails the use of liquid nitrogen to freeze the offending bumps. By the end of the study, 85 percent of the duct-tape group were cured of their warts. Only 60 percent of the cryotherapy group achieved wart-free status.
3. Honey is like nature’s Neosporin.
People have been using honey to help wounds heal for thousands of years, and it turns out that those early doctors were onto something. Honey draws moisture out of bacteria, shriveling them like an empty Capri Sun. Then the moisture reacts with sugars in the honey to form hydrogen peroxide, which is another antibacterial substance.
Apparently honey works just as well for dogs. Maureen McMichael, a veterinarian at the University of Illinois, says that she keeps a big jar of honey in the Teaching Hospital’s emergency room.
4. Black tea does wonders for a sunburn.
Next time you forget your SPF, soothe the burn with a topical application of the strongest black tea you can brew. Throw 3-5 tea bags into the pot and let them steep until the water is basically opaque. Once the tea cools, apply it to sunburned skin with cotton balls.
The flavonoids in tea help to reduce the inflammation in sunburned skin. We know it’s true because the Journal of Clinical and Aesthetic Dermatology told us so!
5. Baking soda is an incredibly effective cure for heartburn.
Most heartburn is caused by excessive acid in your stomach. Baking soda, or sodium bicarbonate, will neutralize excess acid quickly.
When you have heartburn, try mixing 1/4 teaspoon of baking soda into a glass of water and chug. Just don’t try this within two hours of taking other medications. Baking soda can change the way your body processes other chemicals, so it’s best not to mix it with other medicine.
