Here in the northern hemisphere, we’re deep into some of the coldest temperatures winter has to throw at us.  Ultra cold usually means more time spent inside where we’re closer together and that means more chance to catch cold viruses.  for many of us colds can start with sore throat symptoms and this is the best time to treat a cold with homeopathy.  The correct homeopathic remedy selection at this stage can profoundly impact the duration of the cold, sometimes driving it out all together and other times, by moving you into and out of subsequent phases of the cold more quickly.  Here are a few homeopathic remedy suggestions for sore throat symptoms.  Remember, the sooner you catch it the better!

Throat Irritation #17 – from sudden dryness to lingering inflammations, here’s calming throat relief.

If trying to stop a cold while it is just a sore throat or tame painful inflammation in the throes of a cold or flu, this combination offers natural healing relief. This formula’s ingredients have applications for treating sore throat symptoms ranging from mild inflammation to dark red swellings that make swallowing very painful.

Homeopathic Ingredients:

Ferrum phos – The anti-inflammation cell salt, relieves inflammation at the source.

Belladonna – Quickly relieves very dry, red, swollen sore throats that feel raw and constricted especially on the right side.

Mercurius bin – Helps swollen sore throats that hate to swallow due to a lump sensation; its pains move from left to right and may extend to stiffness in muscles of throat and neck.

Phytolacca – Specializes in helping dark red, very painful, swollen sore throats that send shooting pains up to the ears and make sticking your tongue out a painful ordeal.

Throat Tissue K – Eases sore throat pain and inflammation with the cell salts throats depend on.

The cell salts in this combination work with the body’s natural chemistry to speed healing and soothe throat irritation. with the cell salts most important for healing inflammations and acute fevers, breaking down phlegm and congestion, and soothing pain, this natural tissue remedy supports the body.

Homeopathic Ingredients:

Ferr phos – Eases inflammation and boosts cellular support.

Kali mur – Helps the body break down mucus discharge (especially white mucus with white coated tongue).

Kali phos – Eases pain and calms irritated nerves.

Best Single Homeopathic Remedies for Sore throat Symptoms

Mercurius viv -

The Merc viv soar throat sympsoms begin on the right side.  Too hot, too cold but rarely just right. Like the thermometer it has given us, Mercurius cases are very sensitive to temperature changes and often take cold or become discouraged, weary and restless when the weather is too hot, too cold, too cloudy or too damp. That’s just the beginning of this remedy’s instability.

Merc’s many trademark symptoms include smelly discharges, mouth symptoms and a tendency to catch colds or other acute irritations frequently. Mercurius colds have a very sore throat and thick yellow discharges that leave nose, eyes and even ears raw. This leads to sinus congestion, sinus headaches with tearing pains and congestion with bouts of coughing and yellow green mucus.

Kali bich -

The Kali bich sore thoat symptoms are higlighted by red and inflamed throat and swollen glands. Kali bich’s sore, stitching, as if bruised, wandering but ‘in one spot’ pains usually come and go suddenly. chilly individuals who are sensitive to cold (especially on the back of the neck), yet cannot take much summer heat are prime targets for Kali bich symptoms. They tend to avoid mental and physical exertion, are sensitive to allergies, and prefer to live an orderly life completely by the rule book.

Main Category: Immune System / VaccinesAlso Included In: Infectious Diseases / Bacteria / Viruses;  Tropical DiseasesArticle Date: 27 Jan 2011 – 4:00 PST email to a friend   printer friendly   opinions   Current Article Ratings: Patient / Public:Healthcare Prof:

“The cholera bacterium has undergone important mutations in recent years, causing longer outbreaks of the disease with increased fatalities, researchers reported on Wednesday,” Reuters reports. “In a package of papers published in the journal PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases, they said mass vaccinations should be considered as a solution even after outbreaks have begun,” the news service writes (Lyn, 1/26).

“Although easily administered oral vaccines exist, public health officials typically don’t vaccinate against cholera in the throes of an outbreak because medical workers have their hands full rehydrating patients who have come down with the diarrheal disease,” Science News writes (Seppa, 1/25). In recent months, the debate over how useful a cholera vaccine can be during an outbreak has “reignited,” as experts try to slow the spread of the disease in Haiti, which to date has sickened some 105,000 and killed more than 2,000, Reuters writes.

“Caused by a water-borne bacteria called vibrio cholera, [cholera] is transmitted when contaminated human fecal matter gets into water, food or onto someone’s hands” – a particular “challenge to countries without safe drinking water and adequate sanitation,” Reuters continues. While the symptoms from the disease can kill some within hours, others “show no symptoms but can pass the bacterium further” (1/26).

In an effort to assess how a cholera vaccine could have affected the outcome of previous cholera outbreaks, “scientists collected information from three regions where cholera has struck in the past 15 years – Zimbabwe, Zanzibar and India,” and used a computer model to predict outcomes of an early vaccine effort, Science News writes of one of the studies published in the journal (1/25).

In the case of cholera outbreak that took place in Zimbabwe between 2008 and 2009, during which 98,591 cholera cases had been reported with 4,288 deaths attributed to cholera, “[i]f a rapid response had taken place and half of the population had been vaccinated once the first 400 cases had occurred, as many as 34,900 (40%) cholera cases and 1,695 deaths (40%) could have been prevented,” the authors of the study report. “In the sites with endemic cholera, Kolkata and Zanzibar, a significant number of cases could have been prevented but the impact would have been less dramatic,” they add (Reyburn et al., 1/25).

“The PLoS package also included a study from Vietnam, which showed how mass vaccination helped control the disease in Hanoi even after an outbreak occurred in 2007,” Reuters adds. “Fifteen percent of patients given the oral vaccine came down with cholera subsequently, compared to 30 percent of those not vaccinated,” the authors reported, according to the news service (1/25).

“The recent outbreaks of cholera in Haiti, Pakistan, and Zimbabwe suggest that our current global action plans against cholera are failing,” Edward Ryan, of Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard University, who was not involved in the two PLoS studies, writes in an editorial where he describes how vibrio cholerae has evolved in a manner that allows it to linger, allowing for longer outbreaks of the disease. “What role cholera vaccine will play, if any, is still uncertain, and even if cholera vaccine is incorporated into response plans, many logistic hurdles would remain (who will pay, will vaccine be stockpiled, which vaccine would be used, who would control its use, delivery, and deployment, how will a vaccine program synergize with other response efforts and immunization efforts, etc.). But one thing is very clear … we have a wily and adaptive foe that has changed the rules of engagement repetitively, and it may be time for us to similarly adapt our strategies,” Ryan concludes (1/25).

According to Reuters, “There are only about 200,000 to 300,000 doses of cholera vaccine available in the world, and only two companies produce it” (1/26).

This information was reprinted from globalhealth.kff.org with kind permission from the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. You can view the entire Kaiser Daily Global Health Policy Report, search the archives and sign up for email delivery at globalhealth.kff.org.

© Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. all rights reserved.

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In 2007, parasite immunologist P’ng Loke sat down for lunch at a University of California, San Francisco, cafeteria with an inquisitive man who had called him earlier that week. their chosen topic of conversation would deprive many people of an appetite, but the scientist and his guest shared an intellectual hunger for a stomach-churning subject: gut worms—specifically, tiny worm-like parasitic organisms called helminths that live nestled in the gastrointestinal tracts of their hosts. Loke was fully prepared to answer the man’s questions about the parasites he knew so well, but what he did not realize was that his companion had more than just questions—he had worms burrowed in his intestinal walls, worms he had deliberately swallowed. together, Loke and the worm-wrangler embarked on a research project, the results of which appear today in the December 2010 issue of Science Translational Medicine. the 35-year-old man who had lunch with Loke was quite healthy in 2007. but only a few years earlier he was in the throes of an inflammatory bowel disease known as ulcerative colitis. an autoimmune disease, ulcerative colitis inflames the colon and leaves it rife with open sores; patients experience intense abdominal pain, vomiting, diarrhea, rectal bleeding and weight loss. while searching for treatments, the man discovered the work of Joel Weinstock, a gastroenterologist, parasitologist and immunologist at Tufts University who has pioneered research on helminthic therapy—treating autoimmune diseases by deliberately infesting patients with parasitic worms, such as whipworm and hookworm. the results of Loke’s new case study—the most recent of only five studies that investigate helminthic therapy in people instead of animals—suggest that helminths may ease the symptoms of autoimmune diseases by increasing mucus production. "It’s a unique study—there’s nothing like it before," says Weinstock, who was not involved in the new research. "in this case they had a very unique patient—one who was self-infecting with helminths." Clinical trials on helminthic therapy are particularly difficult to arrange because helminths are live pathogens and have not been officially approved as therapeutic agents by any governmental agency, although the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has granted pig whipworm (Trichuris suis) the status of Investigational New Drug. in contrast to human whipworm (Trichuris trichiura), the porcine variety cannot survive inside the human gut for very long. "the researchers noticed a specific pattern of behavior, cycling between remission and active disease depending on when the patient infected himself with helminths," Weinstock adds. "this is not a double-blind study, but the pattern is highly suggestive that the worms helped this patient. the major point of this paper is the potential mechanism—mucus production—which has not been looked at properly before." The might of Mucus in the new study, Loke—who is now with New York University—analyzed the man’s medical records prior to 2007 and personally tracked the man’s health from 2007 onwards. in 2004 the man swallowed a vial of salty liquid brimming with 500 human whipworm eggs, which he obtained from a parasitologist in Thailand. Three months later, he slurped down another 1,000 eggs. the larvae hatched and matured within his gastrointestinal tract, burying their heads in the intestinal wall. by mid-2005, he was virtually symptom free and required no medical treatment for his colitis, except occasional anti-inflammatory drugs to suppress flare-ups. the nearly complete dismissal of colitis symptoms is especially striking because human whipworm infection can itself cause digestive problems, including diarrhea, abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting and, in extreme cases, rectal prolapse. Severe infections can also cause anemia and stunt the growth of children. in 2008, the number of whipworm eggs in the man’s stool began to dwindle, dropping from more than 15,000 per gram to fewer than 7,000 per gram. as the eggs disappeared, the symptoms of colitis returned. So the man infected himself with another 2,000 whipworm eggs and, a few months later, his symptoms practically vanished once again. Repeated colonoscopies revealed that wherever worms colonized his colon, the symptoms of colitis were significantly reduced or nonexistent. during the 2008 relapse, the researchers found that immune cells in tissues with active colitis produced large quantities of an inflammatory signaling molecule named interluekin-17 (IL-17), but very little IL-22, the latter of which has been linked to wound healing and mucus production. when worms recolonized the colon, however, immune cells began manufacturing much more IL-22. Blood profiling and genetic analysis further revealed that tissues in which helminths thrived increased carbohydrate metabolism—a prerequisite for mucus production. "Ulcerative colitis is often associated with decreased mucus production and the worms seem to somehow restore mucus production, possibly by inducing a population of immune cells that make IL-22," Loke says. "It’s possible the mucus serves as a defensive barrier between bacteria and the gut that prevents bacteria from causing inflammation and crossing over into other tissues." Autoimmune diseases generally occur when the immune system overreacts to benign—and even beneficial—organisms living within the body. in the case of colitis, researchers suspect the reaction is directed toward the bacteria in the gut. Loke thinks that the human body may boost mucus production when it detects helminths as a defense against the parasites; for a patient with ulcerative colitis, the extra mucus may also help calm an excessively aggressive immune system. "We saw an association with remission and immune cells that make IL-22, but we don’t know for sure if these immune cells are actually induced by worms," Loke says. "you can’t tell with a sample size of one," which is especially susceptible to the placebo effect. Still, Loke adds, "the results seems quite compelling, especially when you consider the background—all the animal studies and clinical trials that show worms can suppress colitis and other autoimmune disorders." Mounting Evidence in fact, in numerous animal studies, helminth infestation has protected rodents against colitis, asthma, rheumatoid arthritis, food allergies and type 1 diabetes. Researchers have conducted few human studies, but most have shown promise. in a clinical trial published in 2005 in the journal Gut, Weinstock asked 29 participants with Crohn’s disease (another autoimmune inflammatory bowel condition) to ingest 2,500 pig whipworm eggs every three weeks for six months. Twenty-three patients (79.3 percent) improved significantly, and 21 (72.4 percent) experienced remission. both the researchers and participants, however, knew exactly what treatment they were receiving, which makes excluding a placebo effect impossible. in a controlled clinical trial published in 2005 in Gastroenterology, Weinstock and his colleagues gave 52 participants with colitis 2,500 pig whipworm eggs or a placebo every two weeks for three months. Thirteen of the 29 patients (44.8 percent) who received whipworm eggs improved, compared with only four of the 23 participants (17.4 percent) who received the placebo. Weinstock and his collaborators point to these trials as experimental evidence that fits a global pattern: immune disorders are much rarer in less developed countries where helminthic infestation is widespread than in industrialized countries where much smaller populations host helminths. the "old friends hypothesis" proposes that the human immune system cannot learn to regulate itself without exposure to common pathogens like helminths that have coevolved with people and that modern hygienic practices deprive people of this necessary exposure, possibly explaining the relatively higher and more recent prevalence of immune diseases in industrialized countries like the U.S. Loke plans to continue researching helminthic therapy in people and in monkeys. "We are talking about doing a small trial of, say, 10 people and basically doing colonoscopies on them before and after giving them pig whipworm," he says. Loke also mentions that colitis plagues many juvenile monkeys in primate research centers and that he has received a pilot grant to treat diseased monkeys with human whipworm, an as-yet-unpublished experiment that is already returning promising results. "when I first sat down to lunch with the guy who called me and he started telling me his story, I was really quite skeptical," Loke recalls. "but now I am completely changing my mind about helminthic therapy."