Coughing is the body’s way of removing irritating substances, excess secretions, and foreign objects from air passages. This is important, both as a protective mechanism and for the healing process—which is why a cough should not be artificially suppressed with drugs. When a cough is painful, too intense, or prevents good rest, the use of remedies can gently relieve discomfort and help with recovery. Coughing can accompany a wide variety of illnesses or conditions. If a person has serious difficulty breathing, coughs up blood or abnormal discharge, or seems very ill in other ways, professional help should be sought.

Aconitum napellus: This remedy is indicated when a cough has come on suddenly—often from exposure to cold wind, or after a traumatic experience. The cough is likely to be sharp, short, dry, and constant. It may begin during sleep and wake the person up, or can start when the person goes from a cool place into a warmer one. Restlessness and fear are typical when this remedy is needed. It is often used in early stages of croup and asthma.

Belladonna: A cough that comes on suddenly, often with the feeling of a speck or tickle in the throat, is a strong indication for this remedy. The cough is intense and nagging and the person may feel as if the head is about to burst. Sensations of heat, a reddened face, and dilated pupils are often seen when this remedy is needed.

Bryonia: This remedy is indicated when a cold goes into the chest and the cough is very painful and dry. The person feels worse from any movement, and may even need to hold his or her sides or press against the chest to keep it still. The cough can also make the head or stomach hurt, and digestion may be upset. The mouth can be dry and the person may be thirsty. If someone is very grumpy when ill and wants to be left alone, not talked to or disturbed, Bryonia is likely to be the remedy.

The protective ability of influenza vaccines depends primarily on the closeness of the match between the vaccine virus and the epidemic virus, so the presence of non reactive H3N2 SIV variants suggests that current commercial vaccines might not effectively protect pigs from infection with a majority of H3N2 viruses. The current vaccine against the seasonal influenza strain H1N1 is thought unlikely to provide protection. The director of CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases said that the United States’ cases were found to be made up of genetic elements from four different flu viruses—North American swine influenza, North American avian influenza, human influenza A virus subtype H1N1, and swine influenza virus typically found in Asia and Europe.

What You Can Do to Prevent H1N1 Influenza / Swine Flu?

There are everyday actions people can take to stay healthy.

* Cover your nose and mouth with a tissue when you cough or sneeze. Throw the tissue in the trash after you use it.
* Wash your hands often with soap and water, especially after you cough or sneeze. Alcohol-based hands cleaners are also effective.
* Avoid touching your eyes, nose or mouth. Germs spread that way.
* Try to avoid close contact with sick people.
* Influenza is thought to spread mainly person-to-person through coughing or sneezing of infected people.
* If you get sick, CDC recommends that you stay home from work or school and limit contact with others to keep from infecting them.

Above all. Don’t get stressed by the fear of getting the swine flu. Stress can undermine your immune system. The flu doesn’t kill everyone and in most cases may prove benign. Mild exercise, meditation or yoga and healthy nutritious diet can help keep your immune system in good condition and able to ward of any infections. Not every ‘infection’ becomes a full blown ‘disease’. Most infections are taken care of by your body even before you know that you were infected. Most infections affect gravely those people who are vitally deranged. So instead of panicking about the flu, stay calm and focus on becoming a healthy ‘you’.

Atopic eczema is a form of skin condition which is a form of dermatitis. The difference with this form of eczema from dermatitis is that it is most likely caused by exposure of the individual to allergens. People who have atopic eczema may also have other allergies such as hay fever.

This skin condition usually manifests itself around the age of five years old and below. In many cases, the children will eventually not be affected by atopic eczema as they grow older but there are cases of adult having this skin condition as well. Experts believe that genes have something to do with the cause of this condition in people. Other factors to atopic eczema may be the climate, allergens, pollution and diet.

Symptoms of Atopic Eczema

The various symptom of atopic eczema may seem very trivial to some and very common but when put together; they will show signs of eczema. Some of these symptoms are perennially dry skin, red or inflamed creases and skin folds and junctions and having itchy, weepy skin.

Controlling Atopic Eczema

Treating this skin condition may involve several processes. These steps start with avoiding the irritants or allergens that may trigger the eczema. Atopic eczema may be genetically passed from one family member to another but it is an allergic reaction to something in the environment. These triggers need to be known by the individual so that he can avoid them.

Blood pressure can cure kidney failure.blood pressure readings are measured in millimeters of mercury (mmHg) and usually given as 2 numbers. For example, 140 over 90 (written as 140/90).

The top number is your systolic pressure, the pressure created when your heart beats. It is considered high if it is consistently over 140.

The bottom number is your diastolic pressure, the pressure inside blood vessels when the heart is at rest. It is considered high if it is consistently over 90.

Either or both of these numbers may be too high.

Pre-hypertension is when your systolic blood pressure is between 120 and 139 or your diastolic blood pressure is between 80 and 89 on multiple readings. If you have pre-hypertension, you are more likely to develop high blood pressure at some point.

Alternative Names
High blood pressure; HBP; Blood pressure - high cause hypertension

Causes, incidence, and risk factors
Blood pressure measurements are the result of the force of the blood produced by the heart and the size and condition of the arteries.

Many factors can affect blood pressure, including how much water and salt you have in your body, the condition of your kidneys, nervous system, or blood vessels, and the levels of different body hormones.

High blood pressure can affect all types of people. You have a higher risk of high blood pressure if you have a family history of the disease. High blood pressure is more common in African Americans than Caucasians.

Most of the time, no cause is identified. This is called essential hypertension.

High blood pressure that results from a specific condition, habit, or medication is called secondary hypertension. Too much salt in your diet can lead to high blood pressure. Secondary hypertension may also be due to:

* Adrenal gland tumor
* Kidney failure
* Alcohol poisoning * Renal artery stenosis
* Anxitety and stress * Renal vascular obstructions or narrowing
* Appetite suppressants * Migraine medicines
* Arteriosclerosis * Hemolytic-uremic syndrome
* Birth control pills Obesity
* Certain cold medicines Pain
* Coarctation of the aorta Periarteritis nodosa
* Cocaine use Radiation enteritis
* Cushing syndrome Renal artery stenosis
* Diabetes Retroperitonial fibrosis
* Kidney disease, including: Wilms’ tumor
* Glomerulonephrities Pregnancy
* Inflammation of kidneys) (called gestational hypertension)

Symptoms
Most of the time, there are no symptoms. Symptoms that may occur include:

* Confusion Vision changes
* Chest pain Tiredness
* Ear noise or buzzing Nosebleed
* Irregular heartbeat

If you have a severe headache or any of the symptoms above, see your doctor right away. This may be a signs of a complication or dangerously high blood pressure called malignant hypertension.

Signs and tests
Your health care provider will perform a physicalexam and check your blood pressure. If the measurement is high, your doctor may think you have hypertension. The measurements need to be repeated over time, so that the diagnosis can be confirmed.

If you monitor your blood pressure at home, you may be asked the following questions:

* What was your most recent blood pressure reading?
* What was the previous blood pressure reading?
* What is the average systolic (top number) and diastolic (bottom number)?
* Has your blood pressure increased recently?

Other tests may be done to look for blood in urine or heart failure. Your doctor will look for signs of complications to your heart, kidneys, eyes, and other organs in your body.

These tests may include:
* Echocardiogram
* Urinalysis
* X-ray of kidney

Treatment :
* Complications Heart attack
* Aortic dissection Hypertensive heart disease
* Blood vessel damage Brain damage Stroke
* Congestive heart failure Vision loss
* Kidney Damage Calling your health care provider
* Kidney failure

If you have high blood pressure, you will have regularly scheduled appointments with your doctor.

Even if you have not been diagnosed with high blood pressure, it is important to have your blood pressure checked during your yearly check-up, especially if someone in your family has or had high blood pressure.

Call your health care provider right away if home monitoring shows that your blood pressure remains high or you have any of the following symptoms:

* Chest pain Severe headache
* Confusion Shortness of breath
* Excessive tiredness Significant sweating * Nausea and vomiting * Vision changes

Prevention
Lifestyle changes may help control your blood pressure:

* Lose weight if you are overweight. Excess weight adds to strain on the heart. In some cases, weight loss may be the only treatment needed.
* Exercise regularly.
* Eat a healthy diet. Eat less fat and sodium. Salt, MSG, and baking soda all contain sodium. Eat more fruits, vegetables, and fiber.
* Avoid smoking.
* If you have diabetes, keep your blood sugar under control.
* Follow your health care provider’s recommendations to modify, treat, or control possible causes of secondary hypertension.

What has homoeopathy to offer the young man as a future? This question comes to us repeatedly and in our changing economic conditions it is a pertinent question.

Perhaps we can get at the problem best by asking the young man the counter-question: “What do you want to get out of life? ” Only his honest reply to the question can throw any light upon his adaptability to homoeopathy and only upon an honest consideration of his adaptability can we prophesy what homoeopathy has to offer him. Why is he thinking of studying medicine?

Is he lazy and does he consider a profession an easy way to earn a living? Does he look upon medicine as a profession to be sought because of its honourable place in the community or as a position to be desired to secure a standing in society? Has he an ambition to be hailed as a great surgeon or bacteriologist? Is he thinking first of the possible financial returns?

If he would use his foothold as a physician for a life of ease, for a position in the community or in society, or for a means of obtaining fame and wealth, homoeopathy offers him little that he would care to accept.

If he replies to your question of his idea of the direction of his future so that it leads you to think that he looks upon sick humanity as suffering men and women, that he has a burning desire to serve them, to help them to better health and therefore greater usefulness and happiness, then you may be sure there is a sound foundation upon which he may build a plan of life in which homoeopathy will offer him great reward. We can proceed further with our probing of his character and abilities, and determine what homoeopathy has to offer him by finding out what he has to offer homoeopathy.

The man who considers homoeopathy as a possible future must be a student of people and willing to become a student of philosophy. He must be able to read between the true and the false in any symptoms the patient may give; he must possess a sense of values. He must train himself to observe all those signs which the vital energy writes upon the human face, and he must be able to interpret all the signs, which show through habits and circumstances, into indications for the health-restoring medicines which he has at his command.

Hours must be spent in patient study, tracing the course of the disturbance and the remedy to fit it, always basing the process upon the sound rock of natural law.

To the young man who is equipped, and willing to undergo the training for this lifelong task, homoeopathy has everything to offer.

In the first place, homoeopathy offers to the independent mind an opportunity continually to seek new verifications of the natural laws upon which this system of medicine is based. It opens up vast fields to the pioneer, and we cannot gauge the distance that eager minds may travel, nor how greatly the interpretations of these laws may influence the civilization of the future.

Cases of mumps may start with a fever of up to 103 degrees Fahrenheit (39.4 degrees Celsius), as well as a headache and loss of appetite. The well-known hallmark of mumps is swelling and pain in the parotid glands. The glands usually become increasingly swollen and painful over a period of 1 to 3 days. The pain gets worse when the child swallows, talks, chews, or drinks acidic juices (like orange juice).

In rare cases, mumps will attack other groups of salivary glands instead of the parotids. If this happens, swelling may be noticed under the tongue, under the jaw, or all the way down to the front of the chest.

Mumps can lead to inflammation and swelling of the brain and other organs, although this is not common. Encephalitis (inflammation of the brain) and meningitis (inflammation of the lining of the brain and spinal cord) are both rare complications of mumps. Symptoms appear in the first week after the parotid glands begin to swell and may include: high fever, stiff neck, headache, nausea and vomiting, drowsiness, convulsions, and other signs of brain involvement.

Mumps in adolescent and adult males may also result in the development of orchitis, an inflammation of the testicles. Usually one testicle becomes swollen and painful about 7 to 10 days after the parotids swell. This is accompanied by a high fever, shaking chills, headache, nausea, vomiting, and abdominal pain that can sometimes be mistaken for appendicitis if the right testicle is affected. After 3 to 7 days, testicular pain and swelling subside, usually at about the same time that the fever passes. In some cases, both testicles are involved. Even with involvement of both testicles, sterility is only a rare complication of orchitis.

Chicken pox is caused by varicella-zoster virus, a type of herpes virus. The virus spreads through the air via infected droplets emitted from the nose or mouth while coughing or sneezing. Touching the fluid from a chicken pox blister can also spread the disease. Chicken pox is contagious for approximately seven days during a person’s period of infection. Contagiousness begins about two days before symptoms appear and continues until all blisters have formed scabs. Doctors recommend keeping the infected person isolated from others during those seven days.

Chicken Pox Sign and Symptoms
Typically, chicken pox begins with a low fever, headache, rash, and a general feeling of sickness, or malaise. The rash, which usually covers the face, scalp, and trunk of the body, starts as red bumps but quickly develops into small blisters. The rash and the blisters are extremely itchy. As the disease progresses, the blisters break open and form scabs, which fall off after about one to two weeks. The incubation period—the time between initial infection and the first appearance of symptoms—is approximately two weeks.

Chicken pox - TREATMENT & HOMEOPATHIC MEDICINES
Antim tart., Rhus tox, Kali mur., Pulsatilla, Aconite, Ars-alb, Apis, Belladona, Sulphur etc are known to work in cases of chickenpox.

Chicken pox - CONVENTIONAL TREATMENT

Treatment of chicken pox is usually limited to bed rest, acetaminophen for relief of fever and discomfort, and measures that soothe the itching, including lukewarm baths and application of topical medicines such as calamine lotion. Excessive scratching can cause infection of blisters, which can lead to scarring. Acyclovir, an antiviral drug, is used to treat severe cases of chicken pox, particularly in patients with a weakened immune system.

For those who suffer from migraine, homeopathy can be a boon in curing this order. Long term treatment with homeopathic remedies can eradicate migraine headaches.

Migraine headache is not an easy disease to do away with. Even with homeoapthy, moderate to severe form of migraine headaches take a while to get totally cured and usually gradually get better in a phased out manner; they usually do not disappear in one go.

Usually whenever patient experiences such a headache they themselves often start off with paracetamol, aspirin, ibuprofen or other analgesics. OTC drugs may provide some relief, although they are typically not effective for most sufferers, and therefore is a very dangerous and harmful practice.

In allopathy treatment, patients who have been diagnosed with reccuring migraines, migraine abortive medications are prescribed. It means treating the attack at the onset can often abort it before it becomes serious. Similarly many NSAIDs are prescribed for a long time like paracetamol, naproxyn, excedrin, metoclopramide, megraleve, analgesics combines with caffeine and antiemetics. In short they treat the symptoms and not the person suffering from migraine headaches. These medicines are made up of synthetic products and are non organic. So, in one way they might be relieving your symptoms for an hour or so but the other way they are making you face other problems which we call side effects. Most of the pain killers are toxic to kidneys and liver which are vital organs.

Moreover allopathic pain killers are just a temporary solution. They have the same type of medicine for every migraine sufferer. Allopathy just works superficially and does not treat the root cause of migraine headaches.

Studies show that the constant use of pain killers may have a rebound effect - actually causing headaches. Dependence on pain killers may also hamper the effectiveness of endorphins, the body’s natural pain killers.

On the other hand, homeopathy is different; homeopathy treats the whole person and tailor made treatment is devised for each different patient. For example 5 different patients of migraine headache may be given 5 different kind of remedies depending upon their physical and mental makeup, aggravating and ammeliorating factors. There are 253 remedies to choose from for migraine headaches in homeopathy. This is one reason an experienced and knowledgeable homeopathy doctor is required to work on the disease. Homeopathy also helps and transforms people mentally, emotionally and physically.

Homeopathic treatment of migraine headaches depends totally upon the symptoms presented including the psycho-physical makeup of the patient. The character and the modalities associated and also the symptoms associated with the migraine headaches like aura, vomiting, nausea and the trigger factors decide the choice of homeopathic medicine that would help that particular case.

Some of the homeopathic remedies which may be used in a case of migraine headaches under an expert homeopathy doctor are Glonoine, Belladonna, Sangunaria canadensis, Iris versicolor, Gelsemium, Nux vomica and so on.

The duration of treatment varies from person to person. Usually it takes 8 to 12 months to complete the cure though the patient starts feeling better within two weeks of treatment.

Treatment of Low Blood Pressure, Hypotension

Conventional Treatment

Low blood pressure in healthy subjects without symptoms or organ damage needs no treatment. All patients with symptoms possibly due to low blood pressure should be evaluated by a doctor. The doctor needs to identify the cause of the low blood pressure since treatment will depend on the cause.

• Dehydration is treated with fluids and minerals (electrolytes). Mild dehydration without nausea and vomiting can be treated with oral fluids and electrolytes. Moderate to severe dehydration usually is treated with intravenous fluids and electrolytes.

• Blood loss can be treated with intravenous fluids and blood transfusions. If bleeding is continuing, it needs to be treated as well.

• Septicemia is treated with intravenous fluids and antibiotics or other medicines.

• Blood pressure medications or diuretics are adjusted, changed, or stopped by the doctor if they are causing low blood pressure symptoms.

• Bradycardia may be due to a medication. The doctor may reduce, change or stop the medication. Bradycardia due to sick sinus syndrome or heart block is treated with an implantable pacemaker.

• Tachycardia is treated depending on the nature of the tachycardia. Atrial fibrillation can be treated with oral medications, electrical cardioversion, or a catheterization procedure called pulmonary vein isolation. Ventricular tachycardia can be controlled with medications or with an implantable defibrillator.

• Pulmonary embolism and deep vein thrombosis is treated with blood thinners, intravenous heparin initially and oral warfarin later.

• Pericardial fluid can be removed by a procedure called pericardiocentesis.

• Postural hypotension can be treated by increasing water and salt intake, using compression stockings to compress the leg veins and reduce the pooling of blood in the veins. Increasing salt intake can lead to heart failure in patients with existing heart disease and should not be undertaken without consulting a doctor.

Homeopathic Medicines for Hypotension, Low Blood Pressure

Homeopathy can not just give symptomatic relief in cases of hypotension but can also address many root causes of low blood pressure like Bradychardia, Tachycardia, Pericarditis, Schock, Speticiemia, Vasovagal attack, inflammation etc.

The most commonly indicated homeopathic medicines in low blood pressure are:

Carbo-veg, Phos, Sepia, Thyroidinum, Baryta-mur, Aconite, Aranea, Cactus, Curare, Gelsemium, Halo, Histamine, Lachesis, Lyco, Naja, Rauwolfia, Reserprine, Visc., Radium, Theridion, Oleander, Laurocrasis, Acid flour, Adrenalin, Ars alb, Aurum mur, Bartya carb, Bryonia, Crataegus China, Conium, Ferrum met, lycopus, Nat mur, Pulsatilla.