Your Guide to Bronchitis Cures
There are several simple bronchitis cures you can use to get rid of your typical symptoms. Most bronchitis cures do not involve prescription medicines. However, if your bronchitis is part of a larger, more serious condition, you should go to a doctor to have it examined.
What is bronchitis?
Most all of us have heard of bronchitis and know that it involves a cough, but it is not uncommon for people not to know much more than this. Bronchitis is an inflammation of the bronchi. The bronchus is the passageway that moves air up to the mouth and nose. There can be several causes for such an inflammation, but the most common one is a viral infection like the common cold or flu. Physicians term this type of bronchitis an acute bronchitis.
There is another type of bronchitis as well, however. Chronic bronchitis is the condition that most often results from long-term smoking. For this second type of condition, the only kinds of bronchitis cures that really work involve breaking your smoking habit. Although there are some ways that you can help to cleanse your lungs after quitting to help to return them to a slightly more healthy state, typically the damage done from long-term smoking is irreversible beyond a certain point. Thus, if you have developed a smoker’s cough and it has been with you for a long while, you are likely never to completely be rid of it.
Symptoms of Bronchitis
The most common symptoms of bronchitis are the characteristic deep bronchial cough, runny nose, mucus buildup, inflammation of the area around the lungs, congestion, a sore throat, and a slightly elevated temperature.
Treatment
As with most such conditions, in healthy adults with no complicating conditions, bronchitis usually goes away all on its own. The best treatment is rest and fluids. Take it easy, call in sick to work, and drink lots of water or orange juice. In a couple of days, you will feel much better.
In severe cases, if the sufferer is particularly old or young, or if you have other complicating conditions, then you should seek a medical consult. Typically, a doctor may prescribe an anti-inflammatory to reduce the irritation to your bronchi. The doctor may also prescribe a decongestant. (If you are treating yourself, you can also purchase these yourself.) Both these treatments may help take some of the edge off the worse symptoms you may be suffering.
You should not, however, seek antibiotics for bronchitis. Since bronchitis is a viral condition, not only will an antibiotic not help, but it will also have detrimental effects on your health by removing beneficial bacteria from your system. The only time when anti-biotics may be in order are when you have some sort of medical condition that predisposes you to bacterial infection and which you physician feels must be treated preventatively.
If you fear you may be coming down with the flu or with a bronchial condition, there are certain alternative medicines that may help you to head off the worst symptoms. Most notably, Echinacea has shown the most promise as a preventive measure.
Of course, if you have a viral infection and you smoke, you may get the worst of both worlds. Avoiding smoking while you have the flu or a cold is a good idea for several reasons, not the least of which is that it will make your cough much worse. In addition, smoking will weaken your immune system and thus lengthen your recovery. Therefore, if it is at all possible, you should seek to limit your smoking as much as possible during your illness.