Prairie Spring Acupuncture Clinic Palatine, Illinois

Keeping Your Immune System Healthy

Fall is just around the corner, so time to start upping your game to strengthen your immune system, especially if you tend to get sick easily or have compromised immune health. If you’re concerned about your immune health, regular acupuncture can really help strengthen your immune system and help you recover faster when you do get sick.

There are two main considerations for keeping your immune system healthy: 1) Things we’re exposed to, and 2) Things we do to ourselves. But there's also a 3rd component, and that is age.

1. Things we’re exposed to have a big impact on our immune health. Exposure to viruses or bacteria, overuse of antibiotics which kill healthy bacteria in our gut (intestines) just as readily as it kills the bacteria causing infection, and chemicals and heavy metals found in our food and environment are all things you should be aware of. Clearly, exposure to viruses and bacterial infection can tax our immune system as it fights them off to keep us healthy. But what about chemicals and heavy metals?

Chemicals and heavy metals can be found in our food and drinks and the air we breathe. Chemicals that our food is exposed to during the growing season or during manufacturing of food can be extremely detrimental over long term exposure. And although heavy metals are naturally occurring (heavy metals just means they have a relatively high density compared to water), exposure to excessive amounts of them can cause serious problems. Chemicals and heavy metals can affect your thyroid function, disrupt your immune health and create inflammation, which may in turn cause autoimmune disorders, allergies or other inflammatory based issues. So, the less chemicals and heavy metals in the food and water you take in, the better off you are. Going organic can be very important to your immune health.

2. Things we do to ourselves is the 2nd part of our immune health.  This includes emotional balance, nutrition and habits/lifestyle choices. Stress, anxiety and depression can decrease the effectiveness of your immune health, so remain aware of how you’re doing emotionally and if you’re struggling seek help. One of my passions is helping manage emotional health issues, so I’m happy to speak with you about how acupuncture can help. It’s not only important for your emotional wellbeing, it’s important for your immune health!

Bad habits and lifestyle can really affect your immune health as well, and you probably already know all of this. Drug abuse or excessive alcohol consumption, insomnia, and excessive work, can all have a big impact. If you’re struggling with drug or alcohol addiction please reach out for help. Excessive work can’t be helped some times, but if it’s a chronic issue please consider ways you may be able to reduce your work load where you can. Insomnia is a huge problem for millions of Americans, and this can cause many chronic health problems, including weight gain, along with adversely affecting your immune health. If you’re really struggling with insomnia, there lots of things you might be able to do, some are the obvious things you’ve been told all along. But acupuncture can also help, so let me know if this is something you’d like to focus on.

The elephant in the room is nutrition. Everything you eat affects your body for better or worse because it can either create a great place for healthy bacteria to grow and strengthen our immune system, or create a great place for the harmful bacteria that causes inflammation and health problems to grow and weaken our immune system. You know what you shouldn’t be eating and drinking: junk food, soda pop, processed food, refined sugar, and poor-quality foods that lack minerals and trace elements. These things all contribute to a weaker immune system and potentially chronic health issues.

3. The third component is age. As we age, our immune systems can struggle more to keep up with what we're exposed to. So if you're noticing that as you get older you get sick more easily, or you have more difficulty recovering when you do get sick, acupuncture treatment can help. It can improve your immune system strength, reduce inflammation, improve emotional health, and help manage many of the chronic issues that tend to become more prevalent as our bodies age.

If you want to keep yourself and your family healthy, think through what you’re being exposed to, and what you’re exposing yourself to by your own actions, and take the necessary steps to keep your system strong. You may still get sick, but you’ll most likely recover more easily when your immune system is strong and healthy.

And if you feel you need extra help or guidance, that’s what I’m here for. Acupuncture has been shown to help keep your immune system strong, help manage emotional health, support digestive health, and promote good sleep. And it’s also great at helping people recover from colds, flu and respiratory infection.

Stay safe and healthy out there!

Everything is in Bloom and so are Allergies

Spring is in full force, and those of you with allergies are really feeling it. The past few years have also been more challenging for those with allergies. Longer springs with longer growing periods, and milder winters with less freezing weather, have led to many people's allergies worsening, and even some who never had allergies have recently developed them.

In Eastern medicine, the immune system is mainly treated using the lung and spleen meridians. The theory is that the lungs manage the body's defenses and nourish your skin, and this is what protects you from pathogens. If the lungs are not nourished and your energy is weakened, then your immune system is also weakened. Nourishing the spleen meridian leads to nourishment of the lung meridian; this makes sense if you consider that in recent years western medicine has realized that your immune system actually starts in your digestive tract. In Eastern medicine, the spleen meridian is part of how you access the digestive tract.

When I treat people dealing with seasonal allergies I always work on the lung and spleen meridians, nourishing them, as well as working in the area of the sinus cavities to open and clear them of any mucous, and to manage mucous production. And if you tend to get watery or dry eyes, I use the gallbladder meridian to reduce those symptoms. I often recommend people come in a little before the time of year when their symptoms really kick in to help get their body prepared for what's to come, and then treat them regularly until the symptoms are decreased and they are more comfortable.

Here are a few things you can do to help reduce your allergies:

1. Drinking green tea or chamomile tea can help balance the immune system since they both contain natural antihistamines.

2. Steep 2 slices of fresh ginger in a cup of boiling water for 5 minutes; drink this tea twice a day.

3. Eating 1 teaspoon of local, unfiltered, and unprocessed honey daily can also help reduce allergy symptoms.

4. "Sinus Bomb" essential oil mix can be great if your sinuses are really congested, or if you feel like you may be developing a sinus infection. Put 2 drops each of oregano, melaleuca (Tea Tree), peppermint and lemon essential oils in 1 cup of hot water. Close your eyes, and breath in the steam gently but deeply. This will help open your sinuses, and has natural anti-viral and anti-bacterial properties.

5. The combination of lemon, peppermint and lavender essential oils can be a good anti-histamine. You can use 1 drop of each in a diffuser, or 10 drops of each in a roller bottle topped with fractionated coconut oil and apply this topically daily.

6. Be aware of how you're feeling. Stress and physical exhaustion  weaken the immune system, so do what you can to reduce stress and get plenty of rest. And if you feel stress is a big factor in worsening allergy symptoms, let me know and we can work on that as well.

6. There are several acupressure points you can use daily to help alleviate your allergy symptoms. When you come in for acupuncture treatment, be sure to ask me for tips on acupressure and I can show you which points may help you with your specific symptoms.

Reference: Ni, Dr. Maoshing, "Secrets of Self-Healing", 2008, Penguin Group.