My wife and I currently use a Nasal Rinse (Neil Med) and are very happy with it. She recently found many reports (in numerous medical journals/publications) about the effectiveness of the nasal rinses and about how the ENT docs have known this for years. We had noticed that no primary care docs have provided us with that info.....

It got us to wondering about the other old 'real medicine' treatments that we 'don't yet know about' (because we are forgetting them). We're not looking for any "weird" contorversial treatments.....we were thinking about the type of stuff that "the real doctors" used to treat their patients....or used to have the patient help to treat themselves.

Especially now in this world of "resistant" 'bugs', we were looking for some old world treatments.....does anyone have any source ideas for us?

Izzy-

(OP- Sorry to make the thread swerve a bit)

I had that nose surgery, and it's actually not that bad. It looks worse than it feels. You have a really sore nose for a few days- about the same feeling as if you had taken a hard punch to the snout. There's some blood, and gauze, and big globs of bloody stuff you blow out... again, it sounds worse than it was. In fact, it was sort of a gross but interesting experience. I can share some close-up photos I took, if anyone's interested...

All right, I better contribute something to the original poster's thread about old fashioned medicine. How about soaking? I had a boil type of thing that wouldn't go away, but finally a long, hot Epsom salt soak seemed to really dry it out and finally make it go away. An Epsom salt paste is kind of interesting, and seems to draw moisture out of skin that it's applied to.

Hot soaks in general seem to be useful for a variety of things.

Dave

We are familiar with the Neti Pot...(research has found that the 'positive pressure' methods (squeeze the bottle) vs the gravity feed (ie. pour in pot style) are much more effective....)

What we are looking for is for OTHER types of treatments for OTHER problems. Ultimately...we'd like some sort of reference material (preferred medium:book or internet) that provides for those simple but effective treatments (again not weird or controversial off the wall stuff).

It's not exactly something pleasant to discuss, but it is an old time cure. I first heard of it from and engineer that worked at sea with me. He told me he learned it from his father in Mississippi in the 30s. And recently, I was watching an episode of Survivorman. He was deep in the Amazon (The Jungle not the online retailer) and had a nasty case of foor fungus. All I was thinking about was "take off those stinking boots and pee on your feet." Although I use and prefer chlortrimazole, urine works as a cure for fungus. See: http://chetday.com/blog/2005/01/urine-therapy-and-foot-fungus.htm; If I were out covered in sweat anyway, whats a little pee on your feet.

The link seems to be broken. Sigh

You can start with Where there is no doctor. Really a back to basics medical text (downloadable in PDF format).

http://www.hesperian.org/publications_download_wtnd.php

Bill

Puzzling. I cut and pasted it from the url address is was looking at. It was the first site that came up when I googled "foot fungus urine" without quotes.

Try this one: http://www.ehow.com/how_2075188_use-urine-cure-fungus.html

Look to rural medicine or medical treatments in under-developed areas, mainly for minor ailments/treatments. Some of treatments we have used in Ecuador are materials/supplies the locals can obtain or have on hand:

Use of yogurt (locally produced having active cultures), papaya or ginger for intestinal ailments

A hard-boiled egg daily for vitamin deficiencies

Vinegar mixed with a little alcohol for ear hygiene

Boiled rice (mushy) mixed with a little diluted milk or yogurt, sugar and a dash of salt following bouts of vomiting or diarrhea


Pete

CJ, the docs are all out to get you.

My dad had a sure-fire remedy for just about every physical complaint that I might have had. He would suggest that he stomp real hard on my foot to help take my mind off of whatever was bothering me.