Health Conditions Archives - Page 5 of 8

Chinese Medicine and Why You Don’t Sleep

Over the years at Acupuncture in the Park, we’ve found that it’s the rare person who sleeps really well; that person who drifts off easily, stays asleep all night long, and wakes refreshed in the morning ready to take on the day. Why is that?

As kids, sleep seemed pretty simple–you were tired at night, went to bed, and the next thing you knew it was morning. However, as you get older, getting an uninterrupted night of sleep isn’t always a given. Unfortunately, in Western medicine, insomnia tends to be treated in a similar way for every sufferer, which usually means a prescription sleep aid.

In Chinese medicine, however, sleeplessness is treated very individually, and can have a variety of causes. Among them:

-Too much internal heat. If you tend to run warm during the daytime, are thirsty for cool drinks, have lots of inflammation, and/or feel impatient and irritable, your internal engine may be running warm. At night, this heat can cause you to feel hot and sleep restlessly.

-Poor digestion. Eating too late in the evening, overeating, or eating spicy, rich, or greasy foods may keep your digestion running far into the night. In Chinese medicine, this is called food stagnation, and may present as heartburn or lots of stomach rumbling and gurgling at night, making it hard for you to sleep.

-Stress and strong emotions. It’s not a revelation to anyone that stress can interrupt your sleep. Generally, this kind of insomnia presents as an inability to get to sleep when you first go to bed and a racing mind.

-Hormones. Two of the most common complaints from women going through menopause are interrupted sleep and night sweats. In Chinese medicine, this kind of sleeplessness is caused by something called a depletion of Yin, a nourishing and cooling substance in your body. Estrogen is considered to be very Yin in nature, and when levels drop in menopause, it causes some women to wake repeatedly feeling hot and drenched in sweat.

-Depletion. It is possible to be just too wiped out to sleep. This happens most frequently to people who are chronically exhausted, have had a recent surgery or blood loss, or who suffer from adrenal fatigue or a chronic illness. When your insomnia is caused by a true depletion, you may be able to fall asleep, but wake in the early hours and either struggle to get back to sleep, or drift in and out for the rest of the night. This kind of insomnia can also affect people who are just plain tired out.

In Chinese medicine, the cause of your insomnia is an important factor in treating it effectively. There is no one blanket solution; only the right treatment for you. Treatment of insomnia with Chinese medicine is specific to your underlying cause, and would likely incorporate acupuncture treatments with Chinese herbs, some lifestyle tweaks, and dietary therapy.

The Role of Acupuncture in Joint Replacement

Dan* called Acupuncture in the Park out of the blue a couple of months ago. I had seen Dan for low back and hip pain a couple of years ago, but now his hip was really bothering him and he wanted to know if I could help. Apparently he had been limping along with really intense hip pain for the past 18 months. He had gone the conservative route; along with acupuncture, he had tried physical therapy, massage, and chiropractic. He finally landed in the orthopedist’s office, had seen the X-rays, and had resigned himself to having the hip replaced.

Dan’s issue was that he had a couple of major projects at work that he needed to complete, and could not schedule the surgery until about four months from now. His question? The pain was considerable and getting worse; could acupuncture keep him functional until his surgery? While there are no guarantees, I told Dan that acupuncture can be fairly effective for pain, and that it would be reasonable to give it a try.

I saw Dan every week or two until his surgery. I performed acupuncture combined with electrical stimulation, and added heat therapy to the mix. We kept him comfortable, functional, and on some days, even pain-free. Like many patients, Dan would say that there is a role for acupuncture in supporting people who are undergoing hip or knee joint replacement. Clearly acupuncture cannot reverse joint damage from arthritis or replace cartilage. However, there are a couple of ways that acupuncture can help someone who already has or will soon be undergoing this kind of surgery:

Pain relief. Like Dan, many people see the writing on the wall. They know that they will need their joint replaced; they’re just not ready yet. Acupuncture treatments can be an effective and drug-free way to reduce the pain until replacement surgery. In some cases, I have treated patients who were able to hold off on surgery for months, and even years. In addition, acupuncture can be a great way to reduce post-surgical pain.

Getting ready for surgery. Acupuncture can optimize your health prior to surgery. Joint replacement surgery is a huge physical stressor on your body. Working with a practitioner of Chinese medicine with the goal of being in the best health possible prior to the event can help minimize the impact of surgery on your body. I consider these pre-surgical patients to be in training for a major event.

Let the healing begin. Once surgery is complete, acupuncture is a great supportive therapy to assist in the healing process. It can speed healing, reduce pain, and help restore your body to its pre-surgical health. In fact many hospitals offer acupuncture to their patients in the day or two after their surgery. In addition, some patients who go through post-surgical physical therapy decide to schedule an acupuncture treatment after their PT session for pain relief and balance.

Long term support. While many patients are just fine months and years after their joint(s) have been replaced, some people experience aches and pains in the joint when the weather turns cold or damp. When this happens, the options are to tough it out, take a pain reliever, or…that’s right, get some acupuncture.

Many people don’t think about acupuncture when they’re facing joint replacement because acupuncture can’t change the basic structure of the joint. However, those patients who do choose acupuncture as a supportive therapy find that the benefits are surprisingly effective.

*Names and identifying details have been changed.

Acupuncture for Rotator Cuff Pain

Briana’s* case was a typical one for someone with shoulder pain. She came to us complaining of achy pain in the front and side of her shoulder. The pain began slowly, but kept getting worse. While Briana’s pain was dull and achy most of the time, as soon as she tried to raise her arm, she would feel a sharp stabbing pain in her shoulder and down her arm. During those times, the pain almost took her breath away.

One of the most frequent conditions that we see at Acupuncture in the Park is shoulder pain. Shoulder pain responds well to acupuncture in most cases, but it is a complicated joint to treat in general. One of the reasons for it’s difficulty is that while your shoulder is a ball and socket joint (like your hip), it’s a shallow one, and as such depends on the surrounding muscles, tendons, and ligaments to hold the joint in place.

A common source of shoulder pain is a group of muscles that make up something called your rotator cuff. The rotator cuff muscles (supraspinatus, infraspinatus, teres minor, and subscapularis) are actually found on the back side of your shoulder, but act to stabilize the shoulder through a wide range of movements.

Over the years, I have found that much of the grief caused by rotator cuff problems comes from the supraspinatus muscle. This muscle runs horizontally across the top of your scapula (chicken wing), passes under the acromium (the bone at the top of your shoulder), and attaches at the top of your humerus (arm bone). Your supraspinatus muscle helps you lift your arm to the side and is used in overhead motions such as combing your hair, throwing, and swimming. When this muscle is injured or inflamed, the pain may come and go, but frequently it will feel achy—until you lift your arm. Typically you’ll be able to raise your arm to the side only so far before you experience a “catch” that sends a lightening bolt of pain through your shoulder and into your upper arm.

The supraspinatus muscle can become injured from overuse, such as too much keyboarding, lifting, or other repetitive motions. It can also become injured from trauma, such as a fall on the shoulder, having your arm yanked, or a direct hit. It may act up from bad biomechanics, such as poor posture or sitting all day in a bad office chair. Whatever the cause, the pain arises from the muscle and surrounding tendons, which can become torn, inflamed, or impinged (pinched) where it travels under the acromium. Unfortunately, this kind of injury has the potential to become chronic which can greatly limit your range of motion and activity.

If you’re suffering from shoulder pain, there are a number of things you can do to be heal your shoulder and become fully functional again. First, I recommend checking with your acupuncturist for an assessment and treatment. Your practitioner is likely to incorporate acupuncture with something called electric stimulation and a kind of bodywork called Tui Na. You are also likely to be sent home with some instructions for care (such as heat, stretches, etc.) in between visits. If you’re trying acupuncture for this kind of injury, plan to give it four to six weeks minimum to see improvements, as shoulder injuries tend to heal slowly.

Other suggestions to help your shoulder heal include:

-Rest. Yes, I’m sure you’ve heard this a million times before, but quit raising your arm if it hurts to do so. Let the flight attendant lift your bag into the overhead bin and learn to comb your hair with the other hand.

-If your arm was injured due to some kind of trauma, use ice during the first couple of days after the injury to keep the inflammation to a minimum. After that time, I like heat because it loosens up the muscles and increases circulation to the area.

-Check your posture. Pull your heart area upward, your shoulders back slightly, and quit slouching. It’s not helping your shoulder.

-Ladies—get that handbag off your shoulder. It doesn’t matter which shoulder you wear it on, using a shoulder strap causes you to dramatically raise one shoulder higher than the other and pulls your back and shoulders out of alignment, which can aggravate and even cause rotator cuff pain.

-Beyond acupuncture, try working with a physical therapist for a couple of sessions. They can give you some exercises to strengthen your rotator cuff muscles and stabilize your shoulder.

*Names and identifying details have been changed.

Acupuncture and Lung Health

Lately, we’ve been seeing a number of patients here at Acupuncture in the Park who have been struggling with lung issues. Beyond seeing lots of patients with seasonal allergies this hay fever season, we’ve also seen people suffering from pneumonia, pleurisy, and even pulmonary embolism (blood clots in the lungs). While acupuncture shouldn’t be considered the first line of care for these serious conditions, it can be a helpful adjunct in the healing process.

Your lungs are an interesting organ system in Chinese medicine in that they are considered the most exterior of your internal organs. Think about it–with each and every breath, your lungs come into contact with the outside world. In addition, any part of your body that has anything to do with breathing is considered to be part of your lung system. This includes your nose, sinuses, bronchi, and diaphragm.

When you seek out acupuncture for a lung problem, your practitioner has a number of things to consider in their diagnosis before they can begin treating you. Among them:

Is this an external or internal problem? External conditions that affect your lungs tend to be superficial and short-lived, including colds, flu, and seasonal allergies. Internal problems affect your lungs at a deeper level and tend to be more difficult to resolve. Such conditions would include pneumonia, pulmonary embolism, emphysema, asthma, and pleurisy.

It this a warm or cold condition? A warm (or hot) lung condition is usually accompanied by a fever, feeling warm, thirst, and thick yellow mucous (I know, gross!), and sometimes constipation. A cool condition generally is not accompanied by a fever, and the mucous, if any, is thin and clear.

Are the symptoms caused by some kind of excess or a depletion? An excess condition is associated with too much of something–heat, water, phlegm, etc., and can be especially challenging if it’s clogging up your lungs. Another sign of an excess condition is a loud, barking cough. A depleted lung pattern means that you’re run down, short of breath, wiped out, or have low immunity–essentially your energy is low. In this case, your cough may be quiet, unproductive, or non-existent.

Is this a Yin condition or a Yang condition? This one is a little more complicated. In your body, Yin is cool, moist and replenishing. In contrast, Yang is warm, dry, and active. In general, a Yin lung pattern is cool and moist (um… phlegmmy) and a Yang pattern is warm and dry. What if it’s warm with lots of phlegm? Then the pattern would be a little of both.

If you come to a practitioner of Chinese medicine, after determining the nature of your lung pattern, they would work with you using acupuncture, herbs, dietary guidelines, and even lifestyle tweaks to help you resolve your condition. And while most of us don’t think about our lungs until we have symptoms, there are actually some things you can do to ensure that your lungs stay healthy. Among them:

-The most obvious way to strengthen your lungs is to use them. That’s right, breathe. Whether through the intentional breathing of a Yoga class, or through singing, public speaking, or simply exercising briskly, activities that open your diaphragm and cause you to breathe harder are good for your lungs.

-Good posture is key to lung health. Stand or sit up tall to enable your lungs to pull in the air it needs that’s so vital to your well-being and to life itself.

-Foods that are good for your lungs are also foods that build up your Qi (energy). Light proteins, such as fish, chicken, or tofu are helpful. White is the color associated with your lung organ system, so foods such as white root vegetables and mushrooms are also good for your lungs. Pungent flavors open up your lungs, so mildly spicy foods such as scallions, basil, ginger, and other strongly flavored herbs can be nourishing.

-If you tend towards dryness in your lungs, white fruits such as apples and pears are cool and moistening. In contrast, if you tend to have problems with phlegm, avoid foods that make it worse, such as dairy products, rich or greasy foods, and foods that have been overly processed.

-Get and use a Neti pot, especially if you suffer from seasonal allergies. It’s a great way to cleanse your sinuses and wash out any offending pollen. You can find Neti pots at just about any drug store, and include directions for use. Remember, your nose and sinuses are considered part of your lung organ system, and keeping them healthy is the same as keeping your lungs healthy.

Treating Rosacea with Acupuncture

W. C. Fields, the famous comedian in the early part of the 1900’s, was known for his humorous dislike of women, children, and dogs. Part of his act was his hard-drinking persona, with his enlarged, red nose from too much drink. While W. C. Fields may have been a power drinker, his big nose was from an extreme case of rosacea, a skin condition that affects an estimated sixteen million Americans.

Most people might not think of using acupuncture for skin conditions, but in fact, rosacea is something that we’ve effectively treated at Acupuncture in the Park. Rosacea is an interesting animal, as it not only affects your skin with acne-like pimples, but it also is vascular in nature, which causes the flushing and redness for which it’s named.

Rosacea affects both men and women who are middle aged and older. It involves the nose, cheeks, and chin with redness, broken blood vessels, and pimples. It’s often accompanied by easy flushing and a sensation of heat. In more advanced cases, the cheeks can become so red that they appear almost purple, and over time, this condition can cause thickening of the skin, especially the nose, which was the case for W. C. Fields.

Treating rosacea in Western medicine is geared toward managing the acne and inflammation, and involves the use of topical and oral antibiotics or flagyl, a powerful anti-infective. Any long-term solutions involve surgical debulking of thickened tissue or laser surgery to treat broken blood vessels.

In Chinese medicine, rosacea is considered to be a kind of heat in your body. Like heat anywhere, it tends to rise upward, and in the case of rosacea, it affects your face. Interestingly, a great many people who have rosacea also suffer from migraine headaches, which also tend to be caused by heat moving upward and creating symptoms.

We discovered the effectiveness of acupuncture for rosacea almost by accident. We performed cosmetic acupuncture on a number of patients who had mild to moderate rosacea to see if the protocol would help their condition. Not only did their skin look better overall, but their rosacea disappeared. Over time, we discovered that some patients who have rosacea respond equally as well without the entire cosmetic protocol. In some cases, we use a point prescription that combines some local points on the face to reduce the inflammation and redness with other points on the body to clear the systemic heat.

Part of our treatment for rosacea is to determine and eliminate the source of the heat and causes of flare-ups. This involves an assessment and history of the condition, lifestyle factors, diet, and triggers. Once our patients with rosacea complete a course of treatment, we rarely see them except for an infrequent maintenance visit. That’s because their once-inflamed skin is now cool, calm, and under control. Who knew?

Chinese Medicine and Self Care for Seasonal Allergies

During certain times of the year, I see an increase in patients who are suffering from similar conditions. In the late fall, I tend to see more patients who are struggling with seasonal depression, and around the holidays I see an increase of patients coming to acupuncture to be treated for stress. I also see a bump in patients with seasonal allergies in May and again in late August/early September. However, this year spring has sprung early, and throughout April, I have seen a spike in people suffering from seasonal allergies—a month early!

In Chinese medicine, allergies (along with viruses and bacteria) are considered external pathogens, or invaders from the outside that can make you sick. You have a defense system against these invaders, called Wei Qi, which guards the exterior of your body like a protective bubble or shield. When your Wei Qi is weak, all kinds of pathogens can get past your defenses and cause colds, flu, and allergies.

The solution to dealing with allergies is two-fold. You need to strengthen your Wei Qi and deal with the pathogens (in this case, allergens) that are causing your symptoms. Strengthening your Wei Qi, and your energy in general, is important in relieving your allergies in the long run. This can be done by eating really well: whole foods in their original form, lots of vegetables and fruits, avoiding sugar and sweeteners, and staying clear of saturated fats. In addition, you may need to avoid foods that are hard to digest, such as concentrated juices, rich foods, and in some cases dairy products.

Acupuncture and Chinese medicine can be an effective way to deal with allergies on a fundamental level, too. A good practitioner will combine acupuncture, Chinese herbs, food therapy, and some lifestyle tweaks to help boost Wei Qi and alleviate your current symptoms. The best way to do this is to work with your acupuncturist before your allergies act up, if possible. In doing so, you can face the assault of allergy season with a stronger defense system.

The second part of dealing with seasonal allergies is minimizing your symptoms by dealing with what’s causing them. In this case, it’s pollen, which to susceptible people is like a toxic dust that settles on clothes, hair, carpet, and even pets. A few simple tips for getting the p word out of your life include:

-Shower in the evening to get the day’s pollen off your skin and out of your hair.

-Realize that during allergy season, the wind is not your friend. Close your windows when it’s blowing.

-Wash your hands after handling a pet that’s been outside.

-Change your clothes after you’ve been working or exercising outdoors.

-Get a Neti Pot and use it. It’s a small pot to help you cleanse your nasal passages of all that pollen, and can be found at most drug stores.

-Think about buying a really good vacuum, as pollen is extremely fine and will settle on your floors. Dusting is a good thing, too.

Should You Use Heat or Cold?

The other day I pulled a muscle in the front of my thigh during a boot camp class. I felt a painful “ping” in my leg while I was doing some lunges. When I went home, I knew the muscle needed some attention, but what? Should I put ice on it or heat? One of the most frequent questions we get from our acupuncture patients is whether to apply heat or cold to an injured or painful area. This seems like a simple enough question; except it isn’t all that simple. There are a few things to consider when deciding between a heating pad or a bag of frozen peas.

First, the properties of heat in Chinese medicine are that it creates movement. This means that fluids, blood, and energy in an injured area flow better with heat. This movement serves to dilate the blood vessels, loosen tight muscles, increase range of motion, and promote healing.

This sounds pretty good. So why wouldn’t you put heat on just about everything? Well, because good health is all about flow, practitioners of Chinese medicine tend to recommend heat in most circumstances. However, there are a few instances in which cold might be a better choice.

The Chinese think of cold as a river freezing up in the winter–it contracts and slows down. This is also what happens in your body when you apply ice to an injured area. It constricts the vessels and minimizes swelling. During the first hours and days after a traumatic injury, it’s actually a good idea to use ice to keep the swelling down.

Choosing between hot and cold becomes a little trickier in cases of inflammation. In general, inflammation is hot, so you should put cold on it, right? Well, not always. Remember that heat increases blood flow to the area, and increased flow promotes healing.

So how do you determine which to use? Here are a couple of guidelines:

-In general, use what feels better and pay attention to the weather, especially with chronic pain. If your pain is worse in the cold, damp weather, apply heat. If it’s worse in the warm weather, use cold.

-Feel the area of pain. Actually touch it. Frequently it will feel cold from lack of circulation or warm from inflammation. If it feels cold, warm it up. If it’s swollen and hot, use some ice.

-Don’t be fooled by the numbing properties of cold. Your injury may feel better for an hour or so after you’ve iced, but if applying cold makes it worse in the long run, go for heat.

-For sports injuries, physical therapy exercises, or just using your injured area; warm it up for ten minutes or so before use. This will loosen the muscles and increase your range of motion. Then cool it down for five or ten minutes after your workout.

-Do not apply ice to a muscle spasm; it will make it worse. Remember, cold contracts, so icing a painfully contracted muscle will make it hurt more. I learned this the hard way. By the time I figured out that the cold was aggravating a spasm in my lower back, I could hardly walk. How do you know if it’s a muscle spasm? Generally, the pain is pretty sharp, comes on quickly, and inhibits your movement. A high percentage of back pain is caused by muscle spasms.

-If you have a traumatic injury, apply ice for the first 24 to 36 hours to keep the swelling to a minimum. After that time, apply ice if there’s still swelling, if not go with heat, or alternate between heat and cold.

As for my pulled quad muscle, I decided to start with cold. The muscle wasn’t in spasm, just sore that first day. After one day of icing in the morning and evening, I switched to heat for a couple of days, and after two days, the muscle felt pretty good and ready for more boot camp punishment.

Acupuncture and Chinese Medicine for Urinary Tract Infections

Urinary tract infections (UTI’s) are miserable things. If you’ve ever had one, you’re no stranger to the lightening bolt of pain you feel every time you go to the bathroom. You don’t know what to do because it will hurt if you go, but holding it hurts, too. One thing you do know is that you want it to stop hurting.

While what’s going on may seem like a simple bladder infection, in Chinese medicine they’re anything but simple. Like headaches, colds, or back pain, bladder infections (or UTI’s) have a distinct personality. Symptoms can run the gamut from urinary urgency, frequency, difficulty, dribbling, sharp urethral pain, spasms in the lower abdomen, and pain radiating to your lower back.

In Chinese medicine, UTI’s generally fall into a pattern of excess or depletion. Excess patterns are due to an accumulation or too much of something. Bladder infections that are excess tend to be a combination of dampness (an accumulation of fluids) and heat. The most notable symptom of this kind of pattern is a burning pain during urination. A damp heat UTI can be the result of too much alcohol, hot spicy food, sweets, or poor hygiene.

UTI’s that are caused by depletion are usually the result of being run down from aging, not sleeping well, poor diet, and…um, too much sex. Living life a little too fully can wear down your Chinese Kidney and/or Spleen to the point that you’re unable to metabolize water or control the mechanism of the bladder very well. The end result can be incontinence or dribbling, dull and achy pain, and a sore lower back.

To further complicate the diagnosis, in Chinese medicine, bladder infections are grouped into six different types:

Heat. This is the typical bladder infection, with sharp, burning pain. You may also run a fever; have constipation, thirst, or a bitter taste in your mouth.

Stony. This one really hurts with the kind of pain that can bring you to your knees. This is essentially kidney stones, and the symptoms include severe low back or abdominal pain, cramping, difficulty urinating, urinating blood, and passing stones in the urine.

Qi. This is all about your energy, or Qi, and can be either excess or deficient. An excess pattern means that your energy is stagnating and causing symptoms, which include difficult urination, a feeling of fullness or pain in your lower abdomen, and possibly chest tightness or rib pain. A depleted Qi pattern is caused by not having enough energy for your bladder to metabolize water. Symptoms in this case may include a feeling of heaviness in your lower abdomen, dripping or incontinence, possibly a pale complexion, feeling tired, shortness of breath, and an achy lower back.

Bloody. This pattern can also be from either an excess or depletion, but either way, there will be blood in your urine. An excess pattern is essentially heat causing you to bleed, with symptoms such as urinary frequency, urgency, sharp burning pain, and of course, blood in your urine–usually a fair amount. Being depleted can also cause blood in your urine, but there typically won’t be as much blood, or the bleeding will occur over a long period of time. Also, if this pattern is from being depleted, it won’t generally be as sharply painful, but you may feel tired and you may have a weak, achy low back and/or knees.

Cloudy. Like the bloody pattern, this one can come from either an excess or a depletion. The common denominator however, is cloudy or milky looking urine. If caused by an excess, this type will have very cloudy urine with urethral pain and burning. If from a depletion, your symptoms may include dribbling of cloudy looking urine, mild urethral pain, dizziness, ringing ears, and again, a weak or achy lower back and knees. This pattern tends to affect people who have a thin, weak, or depleted body type.

Taxation. This is a total depletion pattern, and comes from overdoing it or being totally wiped out. The symptoms include periodic dribbling of urine, stress incontinence (leaking after jumping or sneezing), fatigue, and an achy, weak low back or knees.

Each type of UTI has a specific method of treatment in Chinese medicine. However, in general, an excess pattern will involve clearing heat and resolving the dampness. This may be done through a combination of acupuncture, Chinese herbs, and food therapy. A common herbal formula for bladder infections is Ba Zheng San, (also called Eight Herb Powder for Rectification). This particular formula works to clear heat and drain out dampness, and in some cases can be used for UTI’s where there is some blood in the urine.

For UTI’s that are caused by being depleted, the first line of treatment may involve Chinese herbs to supplement Spleen or Kidney Qi (energy). Acupuncture and foods chosen to build up your strength may also become part of your treatment. It’s important to remember that it usually takes longer to treat a depletion pattern than an excess pattern. That’s because when you’re depleted, the treatment involves nourishing or rebuilding your body, and this can take time. However, with the proper treatment and time, you can rebuild your body and prevent your symptoms from recurring.

Treating the Common Cold with Chinese Medicine

The common cold is a miserable thing. You feel sick, but not really sick enough to stay home from work. You think your runny nose is finally getting better, but then the whole thing sinks into your chest or you lose your voice. You’re achy, your throat hurts, and you can’t sleep.

What does Chinese medicine have to offer in the way of cold relief? Well, it’s true that there really is no cure for the common cold, but in the Chinese system of healing there are some ways to help shorten the duration of your cold and make you more comfortable while you tough it out.

Your cold has some distinctive characteristics that can help your acupuncturist determine how best to treat it. First of all, a common cold is considered an illness of the exterior of your body. That means that it’s fairly superficial in nature, compared to a deep-seated disease of, say your kidneys or heart. Your cold is also external because you caught it from some outside funkiness, like someone sneezing into your coffee or hanging out at a daycare center.

In Chinese medicine, your cold is considered a kind of pathogenic wind. Pathogens, or stuff that makes you sick, is a little like bad weather in your body. You can have pathogens in the form of heat, cold, damp, and in the case of your cold, you have wind hassling your exterior. Wind tends to affect your upper body with changeable symptoms that come and go, and those symptoms tend to move around–all characteristics of your average common cold.

So, to your acupuncturist, your cold is considered external wind. But there’s more, and this is where some diagnostic skills come into play. Your cold can be associated with symptoms of heat or cold. Heat symptoms include running a fairly high temperature, more fever than chills, a really sore throat, thirst, yellow phlegm when you cough or blow your nose, and painful or red eyes. Cold or cool symptoms include clear phlegm when coughing or blowing, more chills than fever, a mild sore throat, losing your voice, and achiness that tends to move around.

Acupuncture can be helpful in speeding your cold on its way. Your acupuncturist would choose points to clear the pathogen from the exterior of your body, points to warm or cool as needed, and points to resolve your specific symptoms.

In China, herbal formulas for wind plus cold generally start with a combination of ephedra and cinnamon twig, plus other herbs depending on your symptoms. However, in the United States, ephedra can no longer be used in herbal formulas, so your best bet is to talk with your practitioner, who can prescribe the right formula for your symptoms. A common formula for a cold that involves wind plus heat is Yin Qiao San, which helps fight off the cold and relieve the heat-related symptoms. Beyond treating wind plus heat or wind plus cold, you may also need some help if you have a cough, sinus congestion, and wheezing or congested lungs. There are herbal formulas for all of these situations, but you’ll need a little guidance from your practitioner of Chinese medicine.

There are also a few things you can do at home to help resolve your cold. When you feel like you’re coming down with something, or even the first day of your cold, you can try to sweat it out. At home, make a broth of grated ginger and scallions (you can add chicken or vegetable broth), drink it down, bundle up, go to bed and sweat.

If you can’t fight it off, and actually come down with a cold, there are some things you can do, too. If you have wind plus cold symptoms, you will want to warm things up and disperse the pathogen. Common household herbs like cinnamon, basil, cayenne pepper, fennel, mustard seed, as well as ginger and scallions are warming and help relieve your symptoms. If you’re unlucky enough to have a wind plus heat type of cold, the path to feeling better is cooling the heat and dispersing the warm pathogen. Some cooling herbs that you may have around the house that can help include mint and chrysanthemum flowers (as a tea). You can also find teas or powders at your local Asian grocery store that contain the herb Ban Lan Gen (you may have to ask). Ban Lan Gen has antibiotic and antiviral properties and also clears heat–a good choice, especially if you have wind heat kind of cold (but it can be used for either).

We all agree that having a cold is a miserable thing. However, with a little Chinese medicine, self care, and taking it easy, you can speed up your recovery time and minimize your symptoms.

Waterlogged and Damp

I’m a big fan of the Twin Cities Marathon, which is run through both cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul. As a runner, I’ve run the race a few times and like to spectate every year. The race is run the first weekend in October, and here in Minnesota, that means that the weather during the race could be freezing. However, about fifteen years ago, the day of the race dawned cloudless and warm, about 60 degrees. Clearly it was going to warm up over the course of the morning and the runners were in danger of overheating. The race volunteers were ready with plenty of fluids at each aid station, which were located about every three miles on the 26.2-mile race course. Despite the preparation, the weather took its toll on runners that day.

The news the next day told of the carnage brought about by the high temperatures. The First Aid tent was overflowing with overheated and dehydrated runners, some of whom ended up in the hospital. However, the runners in the worst condition were those who had drunk too much. It’s true—there were some runners that day who followed commonsense advice of drinking lots but got into real trouble because they were grossly over hydrated.

How could that happen? Well, drinking too much water can cause an electrolyte imbalance in which the dilution of sodium in your body becomes life threatening. Marathon runners sweat heavily over the course of a 26-mile race, and lose both water and electrolytes. When a dehydrated runner drinks too much water without supplementing the necessary electrolytes, water intoxication, or hyponatremia, can occur. The symptoms of water intoxication aren’t pretty. The electrolyte imbalance causes tissue swelling, which in serious cases can lead to an irregular heartbeat, fluid in the lungs, pressure on the brain, seizures, coma, and death. The good news is, if it’s treated before the swelling causes too much damage, a water intoxicated athlete can fully recover within a couple of days.

So what does this story have to do with Chinese medicine? Well, in the past year or so, I’ve seen several patients in my clinic who in one way or another have been over hydrating. While they weren’t dangerously ill, their water consumption was enough to have a negative impact on their health.

In one instance, a woman in her early 40’s, named Jane, had what felt like a chronic bladder infection that was not responding to Western or Chinese medical treatments. Finally, she went to a clinic specializing in bladder health, and the doctor determined that her bladder was healthy, but inordinately large. Now if you’re a regular beer drinker, that may be a good problem to have, but in Jane’s case, it was causing her discomfort. On questioning, Jane reported that she drinks several 32 oz bottles of water every day. Essentially, the doctor said that drinking so much water had enlarged her bladder to the point of discomfort. Her course of treatment is to drink a lot less.

A second example of so-called water damage has occurred in a number of patients I’ve seen who struggle with chronic diarrhea—the kind that’s life-altering. Most of these patients are having episodes several times a day and can’t eat a meal without having to hit the bathroom shortly afterward. In almost every case, when I ask about water consumption, I find that these patients are drinking a lot–sometimes several liters a day. This causes their digestion to be so waterlogged that it almost completely shuts down. The course of treatment is to drink less, especially with meals, and to switch to room temperature or warm drinks. Through acupuncture, herbal medicine, and dialing back the water, these patients have seen their diarrhea go away completly or be greatly reduced.

In Chinese medicine, these are both cases of something called dampness, in which your body is unable to metabolize water effectively. In both of these instances the dampness was brought about by drinking too much water. Dampness is almost always a digestive issue, in which your Chinese Spleen gets bogged down and can’t make good use of the fluids in your body. Dampness can be the cause of a number of symptoms including diarrhea, bladder infections, yeast, poor energy, joint pain, headaches, and a feeling of heaviness. In addition, that excess roll of fat around your middle or on your thighs is also considered to be damp tissue—it’s moist and heavy—a little bit like wet sand.

There are a number of reasons you become damp. The most common include drinking too much, eating too much, eating the wrong foods (sweet, rich, greasy), stress, and living in a damp place, like England or a basement. Dampness is a drag, because like wet sand, it tends to take a long time to dry out.

The best way to deal with dampness is to not become damp in the first place. This means eating good food in moderation; getting a little exercise; saying hydrated, but not over drinking; and maintaining your weight. Being proactive against dampness also means paying attention to your digestion. Some simple ways to improve the digestive process include sitting at the table when you eat, chewing your food well, and drinking small amounts of room temperature water or hot tea with your meals.

While symptoms caused by dampness, and dampness itself can be a challenge in the acupuncture clinic, it can be resolved. Through the use of acupuncture, drying or draining herbs, Chinese food therapy, and some lifestyle tweaks, dampness can be something you talk about in the past tense.

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