Some people swear that if you place Vicks VapoRub on your feet (or your youngster’s feet) it will certainly help with a cough.
Vicks VapoRub has actually been around since 1919, when a Spanish flu epidemic strengthened its area in American medicine closets. Yet just in relatively current history have customers started utilizing it on their feet rather than its desired application on the upper body and neck.
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There’s no actual clinical proof that rubbing the coughing suppressant on your soles (complied with by socks, obviously) can stop your hacking, but there is lots of unscientific evidence.
What is Vicks VapoRub?
The salve energetic ingredient is menthol, which Rutgers University doctor Satya D. Narisety, M.D., tells Parents.com, “doesn’t really open respiratory tracts or break up mucous, but … technique [s] your mind into thinking your air passages are opening up and also you’re not so congested.”
A family friend told me about the ole timers remedy of using Vicks on bottom on the feet for a cough. This was back several years ago when I couldn’t get rid of nagging cough. After 2-3 nights of using it on my feet with socks covered, my cough went away. It has also worked for my daughter several time over the years. ~ Rebecca E
What the Research say
Joe Graedon, a pharmacologist with an M.S. from University of Michigan, has a concept regarding how the Vicks-on-feet treatment could function. Based on recent research by Nobel champion neuroscientist Pole MacKinnon, M.D., and also his colleague Bruce Bean, Ph.D., of Harvard.
MacKinnon and Bean’s studies demonstrate how overstimulated nerves activate muscle aches. His study found that drinking a spicy beverage of cinnamon, ginger, and also pepper remove boosted nerves in the mouth, throat, and belly, which, as Graedon creates, “influenced the spine and also overwhelmed the nerves that were causing muscle aches.” The searchings for could assist discuss why so many people promise eating a tbsp of mustard cures their nighttime leg pains.
Given that feet contains lots of nerves, Graedon guesses that sensory nerves in the soles of the feet may reply to excitement with Vicks VapoRub:
The [brain’s] cough center is right next to the spinal cord. If the sensory nerves in the soles of the feet stimulate the spinal cord, they might be able to interrupt the cough cycle.
Takeaways
Once again, the remedy hasn’t been observed in any type of main capability (neither exposed by the experts at Snopes.com!). But there seems to be no damage in trying it on your own the next time you really feel a whooping fit coming on. If nothing else, you’ll end up with smoother feet.
