Aspirin does a great job at easing the discomfort of a sore throat. I like chamomile tea with honey to soothe a cold and sore throat, too. Last time I had a bad throat and cold symptoms, it was caused by Covid, just saying…..

Gargling with soluble aspirin can help.

What is soluble aspirin? That's a new term for me. Is it the regular type that doesn't have a hard coating?

All aspirin must be ultimately water soluble, otherwise, wouldn't it pass through the digestive system without being absorbed?

Tru gargling with salt water.

^Warm salt water can help. Tylenol helps me the most.

We have an iodine based throat gargle here that always does the trick for me. Also antiseptic throat lozenges called ”Strepsils”.

When it’s really sore, I’ve used Chloraseptic spray. It numbs it so at least you can swallowa cold milkshake.

"What is soluble aspirin?"

Elmer, ever heard of Google? I know, it's pretty new so you may not have heard of it. You can ask a question, and it will give you an answer.

🤣

I drink hot ginger water with lemon and honey........Simmer ginger in water on the stove, and add some honey and lemon to taste when you ladle some into a mug.

" All aspirin must be ultimately water soluble, otherwise, wouldn't it pass through the digestive system without being absorbed? "

We have acids and enzymes in our digestive system to break down things to allow for their absorption - they don't need to be water soluble. In fact, some drugs and vitamins are fat-soluble, which is pretty far from being water soluble -- their absorption by the body is aided by dietary fat.

I had never heard of ’soluble aspirin’ either. sephia_wa you’ll be happy to know I have heard of Google & do utilize it often. I found this ”Jul 23, 2024 — Aspirin comes in many forms, including: pills; powders; oral gels; soluble tablets. Some types of aspirin can be bought over-the-counter from ...” Who knew? Not me! I only knew of pill type & enteric coated or not.

^^^^ It gives me a laugh when people post a question that they can get the answer to by googling it themselves. Especially smart people like Elmer.

sephia_wa - I knew that. I was showing everyone how smart (aleck) I am too. 😉

^^^.🤣🤣

Soluble aspirin used to be the norm for aspirin here. I disliked them intensely as the taste is very unpleasant.

"Don't wait for a response from me to your rude comment, it's not worthy of my time or anyone else's."

But you did just spend some time to respond. Couldn't help yourself 😂 And calling out "who may or may not be smart enough..." when you couldn't think to google a question for yourself.

I like Olba’s lozenges. They don’t have a bunch of junk in them, just the ingredients you need.

Honey in tea is good, but for it to have any value besides sweetening, it needs to be good quality.

I add a little tobasco to a glass of very warm water and gargle with it. The hotsauce sort of numbs the soreness.

Also, I think what floral was referring to is powdered aspirin. When I lived in Georgia, there was a popular aspirin called Goody Powders. I still keep a box of them in my medicine cabinet for emergencies. I've heard that when someone has a heart attack, to give them aspirin. I always figured powdered would be easier to administer.

Jupidupi, I am not referring to powdered aspirin, which I have never seen. Soluble, aka dispersible, aspirin is a tablet which you dissolve in water and gargle. It is the commonest form of aspirin available here. There are issues around taking aspirin but for gargling it's fine. It's also very cheap. Less than £1 for 32 300mg tablets.

joann -- I hope this will be your last bout for a while. Do you need to test for strep?

Gargling with salt water has been my go-to for sore throats. I also stock a spray bottle of the Chloraseptic bpath mentioned; it can get me through the night if the pain is terrible.

I'd be wary of very old aspirin. It won't hurt you, but it won't help either. Dump any that smells like vinegar.

Chloraceptic and warm salt water are both good suggestions. I like a tea called Traditional Medicinals Organic Throat Coat (grocery store), but I think Chloraceptic is the strongest to get relief. Hope you feel better, Joann.

I like Celestial Seasonings Lemon Zinger tea with honey. They used to have a lemon cough drop, but I think that has been discontinued.

I ditto warm salt water. The salt actually reduces inflammation and will even disinfect. The warm to hot water will help dissolve mucus. It is the first line of defense in our household. You can use it as often as you like. Chlorseptic can numb the pain but it also use the salt water.

I take Benedictine and Brandy for a cold. It actually helps with congestion.

patriciae

I don't often remember it but yes salt disolved in warm water was a basic one from way back. Very helpful, very soothing, and I also understood the salt to help with the infection.

A nurse at the cancer center said she became a fan of salt water when she was living near the sea one summer. She credited frequent dips in the ocean with healing a gash on her leg in record time.

I swear by oregano oil. You put one or if you can take it 2 drops under your tongue. It is hot, but it has been shown to have anti-viral properties. As soon as I start getting a scratchy throat or post nasal stuff, I start using it twice a day. I swear I have gotten rid of many colds that way before they've even taken hold. And if I do get them, it seems to make them milder.

https://www.healthline.com/health/oregano-oil-for-cold

The article linked, in case it matters in weighing how medically authoritative it may be, was written by a nurse. In it, three projects were mentioned prominently:

-one from 2017 from China that found oregano can have antioxidant properties. Not sure how that's relevant

-one from Brazil from 2011 that found that oregano can have antiviral properties in vitro. Which means, in a test tube or lab culture dish. Not sure how that's relevant, and

-one from China described as "a small one", that found oregano could reduce pain in rats. I'm not sure how that was assessed but similarly, that doesn't seem to be relevant.

For me, neither the author nor the cited studies are particularly confidence inspiring from a credibility perspective but we each can make our own assessments.

Annie, that’s a good article. If you grow it, chewing some fresh oregano also soothes the sore throat from my experience. The article was medically reviewed by Dr. Debra Sullivan, who is also an RN with impressive credentials, not by some know-it-all, sans credentials on a public forum.

A salt water gargle was my mom’s advice, and it worked for some things. When you can’t gargle, Chloraseptic.

I really liked my mom’s advice when I was living on my own. For my cold: ”Gargle with warm salt water a few times a day, and take vitamin C and pantothenic acid. If you do all those things, your cold will be gone in 7 days. If you do nothing, it will take a week.”

palisades, the person is a nurse who teaches other nurses. The "research" she's done, as per the bio accompanying the article, has been on the topics of the mental health of nurses and nurse burnout.

" The article was medically reviewed by Dr. Debra Sullivan, who is also an RN"

Nurses absolutely DO NOT have the training or experience to critically assess or review ANYTHING relating to medicine or biomedical science. Qualified scientists and physicians would laugh at such a notion.

Nurses do not have the education or training to do biomedical research and don't. Nurses don't treat illnesses or diseases - this is what physicians do.

There's a difference between a "know it all" a" knows-somethings" and a "know-nothing". I'm not a know it all, far from it, but I'm also not a "know nothing" If anything in my comments seems incorrect to you, please point out what you take issue with.

Tylenol. Salt water gargles. Anything sugary just increases mucus production for me so I stay away from lozenges. If I have a terrible cough/tickle and have a dry throat I have been known to take a teaspoon of honey to ease the tickle.

Drink loads of flus and pee. I also try to sleep as much as possible so I'm not awake to experience the throat pain.

Sorry you've had this twice!

If a particular herb or therapy works to alleviate discomfort, do we really care if there are supporting articles?

Oh Elmer, there is only one consistent factor here. If I post it, you will disagree. I could post a link to Einstein's relativity theory and you would find fault with it. We get it.

In case anyone *else* is interested, you can google search it and AI links to a number of studies on the effectiveness of oregano oil against different kinds of viruses. No point in my linking them here. But frankly I don't care. I find it effective *for me* and you may too.

Dead horse, Elmer...it's starting to decompose. Let it go.

Take it outside. Can we get back to sore throat remedies, please?

Hey Elmer, “Her expertise includes cardiology, psoriasis and dermatology, pediatrics, complementary medicine,…”. Those are expertise you and many of us do not have. You need to earn those to judge people. Heck, from my last link about potato leaves benefits, you declared an MD a quack even though they were trained from an accredited institution in the USA. Why do you continue to make a fool of yourself?

That smell you smell is a rotting horse. Someone needs to bury it.

In point of fact a Nurse Practioner is not a Nurse. They have additional training well over and beyond a regular nurse.

As GP's have more and more essentially become NP's what is the difference? They mostly serve to take vitals, collect information and send you to what ever specialist you need to see. Over the past fifty years or so the information needed to practice medicine has grown tremendously. Since when do GP's deliver babies or set more then the simplist fracture or stitch up any but the simplest wounds. They send you to a cardiologist for your heart problems and a pulmonologist for your lung issues. And that is what the NP does. My very first NP 25 years ago in addition to being a generalist was a gynecological NP. My Gynecologist used her for her own care and she was also an Asthma specialist and way better than the local so called Asthma Specialist. My Oncologist has a NP on staff and I see her instead of him every other exam. She is an oncological specialist carefully watching for the signs that I need to be back in treatment. My sleep specialist has two NP's and they are excellent and really detailed. They dont just follow orders, they make changes in my settings. A NP usually has more time with you. It is a great system.

patriciae

The author of the article is not a nurse practitioner. She's an RN.

As for this:

" As GP's have more and more essentially become NP's what is the difference? "

The difference is that an MD has double the years of education and training. That's a big difference.

My primary care provider is a board certified internal medicine MD and that's all there is in the office. I would never accept anything less.

Nurse practitioners, physicians assistants, paralegals, etc., are of a similar ilk - they're individuals with less training than the principals they work for, but are able to work under supervision (which is the case in most states for nurse practitioners). They get paid much less and provide manpower leverage, allowing the principals to multitask by providing extra sets of eyes and hands.