Stories tagged cold

My daughter will tell you that you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. (She hears that a lot, but she doesn't practice the method.)

Tastes good, soothes a cough: Scientists validated the home remedy, giving solace to parents of kids with coughs everywhere.
Courtesy biskuit

Turns out you can also soothe a cough with honey. That's good news to parents of kids under 6, since the FDA recently pulled most over-the-counter cough and cold medicines for kids in that age group off the shelves.

My family's always used honey to help soothe a cold, but I always figured it was a comfort measure more than anything else. (You know: colds are caused by viruses, and there's not much you can do to treat a virus. You just have to let it run its course, and try to make yourself feel better in the meantime. At our house, that means honey in warm milk for the small people, and honey in tea for the big people.)

A small clinical trial, though, proves the home remedy. Researchers compared the effect of a dose of buckwheat honey against a dose of dextromethorphan (a common OTC cough medicine) or no treatment at all. Pennsylvania State University researcher Dr. Ian M. Paul, one of the study's authors, told Reuters Health,

"The results were so strong that we were able to say clearly that honey was better than no treatment and dextromethorphan was not."

Kids who took the honey had the greatest reduction in cough frequency and the most improved sleep. (As did their parents--good news for me!)

Why does honey work? Scientists aren't sure, but it's soothing to the throat, rich in antioxidants, and has antimicrobial properties.

So how much honey should you give a child? The researchers used a dose identical to that recommended for cough syrups: half a teaspoon for two- to five-year-olds, a teaspoon for six- to eleven-year-olds, and two teaspoons for children twelve and older.

It isn't all good news, though. Some parents are still out of luck because honey is an absolute no-no for children under 1 year old. (It could cause a kind of food poisoning called botulism.)

Tags : health, cold, honey, cough, over the counter, dextromethorphan, medications, child, kid, sick kids

read more... | add a comment | share

It's cold this morning. Maybe the coldest morning of the season so far? Luckily, there's also a lot of sunshine, and almost no wind.

If it were windy, you'd hear the weather forecasters talking a lot not only about the air temperature (-6 degrees when I left the house), but also about the "wind chill." Wind chill is a way to describe how quickly heat is transferred from your body to the atmosphere when it's both cold and windy outside. As wind increases, more heat is drawn from your body, decreasing your skin temperature and eventually your internal body temperature. Wind chill makes it feel much colder than it actually is.

Last year, I overheard a woman in the Science Museum parking garage elevator talking about how she parks her car in a sheltered area to protect it from wind chill. She was worried that, if she left it in a more exposed area, it wouldn't start. I can't say anything about the state of her car battery, or condensation on her distributor, but I can say that wind chill has very little impact on cars or any other inanimate objects: wind will shorten the time it takes for an object to cool to the temperature of the surrounding air, but it won't get any colder than that no matter how much wind there is.

For humans and animals, though, wind chill affects how quickly hypothermia and frostbite can occur. Hypothermia is a condition in which core body temperature has fallen to the point where normal muscle and brain functions are interrupted. (Thor did a post about hypothermia a few weeks ago.) Frostnip/frostbite are conditions in which body tissues freeze. Knowing the wind chill helps us make decisions to avoid these and other cold weather dangers.

She's got the right idea: Bundle up! (Photo by Yann Richie)

The best thing to do when there's a significant wind chill is to stay inside. But you can't stay at home on the sofa all winter. So what can you do? Dress right when you go outside. That means wearing several layers of loose-fitting, lightweight, warm clothing. (Trapped air between the layers will insulate you and keep you warm.) Stay dry. (Remove layers if need be to avoid sweating and later being wet and cold.) Wear a tightly woven, water repellent, hooded top layer. Cover your mouth to protect your lungs from the cold. Mittens, which allow your fingers to share warmth, are better than gloves. And your mom was right: wear a hat! Half your body heat can be lost from your head.

Tags : weather, hypothermia, cold, winter, wind chill, heat, heat transfer, frostbite

read more... | add a comment | share

Cold times: Winter is a prime time to feel the effects of hypothermia. Do you know what to look for if your core body temperature is getting too low? (Illustration from National Forest Service)While our winter has been generally mild over most of the U.S. this season, you can never get too much information about the dangers of hypothermia.

As the recent news accounts of the missing hikers on Mount Hood reminds us, hypothermia and other impacts of extended exposure to snow can have drastic impacts on us.

So what exactly is hypothermia, anyway?

You’re probably well aware that our optimum body temperature is 98.6 degrees F. That’s the best and most efficient temperature for chemical reactions to take place in our body, reactions that keep our body working.

When our body temperature goes below 98.6 degrees, those reactions slow down. The colder our body gets, the more severe the impacts will be on our body. And it doesn’t take too much of a change in our body’s core temperature to have significant impacts on our bodies.

The first stages are considered mild hypothermia – when your body’s core temperature drops to 96 degrees F. Characteristics that show up in that stage are shivering and difficulty in doing complex motor actions (like skiing or skating). You can still walk and talk without difficulty.

Frozen face: Skiers may have ice on their face while they're on the slopes. But hypothermia will chill down their insides. (Photo by nakohe)The second stage, moderate hypothermia hits when your body’s core temperature ranges from 95 to 93 degrees F. Symptoms that can set in at that stage include dazed consciousness, loss of fine motor coordination (difficulty zipping up a coat, for instance), slurred speech, violent shivering and irrational behavior. In some cases of that last symptom, people will start to take off their clothes, unaware that they are actually cold.

If you don’t start to warm up, you’ll head into severe hypothermia – when body core temperatures can range from 92 - 86 degrees and below. These temperatures are immediately life threatening. You personally probably wouldn’t recognize these symptoms if you had them, but they include shivering in waves, falling to the ground and assuming the fetal position, muscles becoming rigid, skin becoming pale and pupils dialating. At around 90 degrees of core body temperature, the body actually goes into hibernation, shutting down blood circulation to the outer extremities with heart and breathing rates reducing. At 86 F, the body becomes a “metabolic icebox.” The person will look dead, even though their inner body is still active.

The tricky thing with hypothermia is, the farther you go into it, the less you’ll be able to recognize it. But should you come upon someone suffering from severe stages of hypothermia, here’s what you can do.

With some help, using the person’s body is the best way to warm him or her up. First may sure the person is dry. Then create a shell of total insulation for the person. That can include sleeping bags, blankets or wool clothes. Don’t worry about having too many layers. A four-inch bundle of insulation around the person works great. Don’t ever put the hypothermic person in a sleeping bag with another person.

Other things to consider are fuel for the body. In severe hypothermia, the stomach shuts down. But getting warm fluids into the cold body will have a great impact. Give a suffering person a mixture of warm water with sugar every 15 minutes. Those nutrients will be absorbed right into the blood stream and help create more body heat to warm the body. Let the person urniate as well. After the urine has left the body, more internal body heat will be directed to heat up other organs.

What can you do to prevent hypothermia? First off, wear plenty of warm, water-proof clthing when you know you’ll be out in cold weather. Also, use the buddy system with another person to check each other’s face, cheeks and ears for signs of frostbite. Do a regular self-check on yourself for cold areas, wet feet, numbness or anesthesia. If you discover a cold injury, warm up that area as soon as possible.

Tags : hypothermia, cold, winter

read more... | add a comment | share