There is no cure for the common cold, but researchers might have found a safe and simple way to reduce a child's symptoms and the chance of recurrence: wash out the nose with seawater.
In a study published Monday in The Archives of Otolaryngology: Head and Neck Surgery, scientists assigned 289 cold or flu patients ages 6 to 10 to be given a nasal wash three times a day with water from the Atlantic Ocean that had been commercially processed but retained seawater's trace elements and minerals.
As comparison, a group of 101 children used ordinary over-the-counter cough and cold medicines. Their symptoms were tracked over three months.
Patients on the saline treatment used fewer over-the-counter medicines, had fewer breathing problems and other cold symptoms, and reported fewer illnesses and school absences. The differences were statistically highly significant.
The authors acknowledge that the study was not blind and that the results depended in part on self-reporting by patients. The work was financed by Goemar Laboratories, a French manufacturer of a saline solution based on seawater.
"It makes sense to clean the cavity where the microbes that might worsen the infection are present," said Dr. Jana Skoupa, a co-author of the study, who works for a company that provides information to the pharmaceutical industry. "That's what the seawater does, and it's the minerals and trace elements in the seawater that help to restore the mucus lining of the nose."
Heed advice, prolong life
The advice is as sound as it is familiar: avoid smoking, exercise, eat lots of fruits and vegetables, drink alcohol if you want (but not too much). Now researchers have figured out exactly how many years these habits will add to your life.
An 11-year study, published January 8 in PLoS Medicine, began with interviews of more than 25,000 men and women ages 45 to 79 in the English county of Norfolk. The researchers gathered information on health and illness, smoking, alcohol consumption and physical activity both in manual work and at leisure. The participants also had physical exams and blood tests to determine vitamin C levels . Using this data, the researchers built a simple 0-to-4 scale that indicated how many of the four behaviours each person habitually engaged in — one point each for not smoking, exercising, drinking moderately and eating the proper amounts of fruits and vegetables. The trend was unmistakable: with each added positive behaviour, people lived longer. Those who scored 4 had about one-quarter the risk of dying of those who received a 0 -- equivalent to living an additional 14 years.
