By: Hannah Darnell, RN
When you think of old wives’ tales, what comes to mind?
- Catch a cold while out in the cold
- Spread room temperature butter on burns
- Starve yourself during a fever
- Eat up for a typical cold
- My personal favorite, ice baths to cool body temp. with high fever, (it’s a brutal burr)
Let’s dig a little deeper with these old-time stories and uncover the truth, join me like a sleuth.
Research to-date has discredited many alternative medicinal folklores. Some examples include:
Run inside or you’ll be caught by a cold. Truthfully, catching the common cold is unrelated to being in cold nature, rather being inside more often. (1)
Placing a slab of butter on your burn, while easing the cooking process like you would a juicy steak. (2) Butter may also contain germs, adding more insult to injury. The best course of action is to run cool water over the burn, similar to boiled eggs or spaghetti noodles; to stop the cooking process, you place them in cool water. (2)
Starving a fever has a ring of truth, but it's not Lord of ALL the Rings. Your body, absent of nutrients, will indeed lower your temperature. (more research needed to consider whether belly growling will elevate or de elevate temp. 😊), but your immune system cannot fight infection without protein. (1)
I’m ready for that cold so I can eat my way out of it, if only! Feeding a cold maybe appropriate for body’s immunity’s sake, but most importantly, fluid intake is a must. Dehydration is all apart of fevers and colds. It’s no fun drinking bland water when you have a sore throat, but it’s what you need to stabilize your internal fluid balance. (3)
Ahh, we’ve reached my favorite tale of all tales, ice baths to reduce fevers. This may seem like common sense, but nowadays we have learned that in everything-moderation. Ice baths are uncomfortable and unnecessary to rid fevers. (3) Tepid or warm baths are acceptable. The problem with ice baths is the shock your body absorbs from one high temp. to an extreme low. While it may be relieving to see you or your child quivering, the body is actually working overtime to compensate the sudden cold shock, that ironically, elevates fevers even more so.
Conclusion
Remedies are interesting in the essence of oral story-telling. Many cultures, races and socio-economic groups have differing ideas about treating ailments. (1) Traditions include oral stories that have survived decades, as one familial generation imparted them to another. We now realize that while some remedies have a smidgin of truth, most are hyperbolized.
References:
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7329847/
https://sites.utexas.edu/think-twice/2019/08/20/butter-for-burns/
https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/wellness-and-prevention/feed-a-cold-starve-a-fever
Photo by Stockcake
