Feeling under the weather? A healthy lifestyle can help improve your immune function!
Now that the weather is warming up, maybe you’re ready to attend more gatherings.
So what can you do to boost immunity? Here are some surprising ways to help prevent a cold or flu:
- Wash your hands. Did you know that hand-washing alone can prevent illnesses? This easy practice may prevent close to 30% of diarrhea-related conditions and almost 20% of colds. The CDC further explains: “Reducing the number of these infections by washing hands frequently helps prevent the overuse of antibiotics—the single most important factor leading to antibiotic resistance around the world. Handwashing can also prevent people from getting sick with germs that are already resistant to antibiotics and that can be difficult to treat.”
- Reduce smoking. Cigarette smoke contains over 7,000 chemicals, so smoking alone can hinder the equilibrium of your immune system. Nicotine can suppress your immune function and puts you further at risk of getting sick. It also reduces the amount of antioxidants in your body, which means it can lessen your vitamin C levels. If you need help quitting smoking, please speak to your health care practitioner for advice.
- Catch up on sleep – seriously! We don’t mean to sound like mom or dad, but a lack of sleep can take a toll on your wellness. The Mayo Clinic explains that if you don’t get good quality sleep regularly, there’s a higher chance of getting sick when you’re exposed to a virus. So, practice good sleep hygiene – turn off your devices before you sleep, avoid late-night coffee, and stick to a regular bedtime.
- Reduce stress. Further research is necessary, though studies are showing that the more stress you have, the more likely you’ll get sick. “Stressors with the temporal parameters of the fight-or-flight situations faced by humans’ evolutionary ancestors elicited potentially beneficial changes in the immune system. The more a stressor deviated from those parameters by becoming more chronic, however, the more components of the immune system were affected in a potentially detrimental way,” says a review from the journal Psychological Bulletin.
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References:
https://www.cdc.gov/handwashing/why-handwashing.html
https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/insomnia/expert-answers/lack-of-sleep/faq-20057757
Qiu F, Liang CL, Liu H, Zeng YQ, Hou S, Huang S, Lai X, Dai Z. Impacts of cigarette smoking on immune responsiveness: Up and down or upside down? Oncotarget. 2017 Jan 3;8(1):268-284. doi: 10.18632/oncotarget.13613. PMID: 27902485; PMCID: PMC5352117.
Segerstrom SC, Miller GE. Psychological stress and the human immune system: a meta-analytic study of 30 years of inquiry. Psychol Bull. 2004 Jul;130(4):601-30. doi: 10.1037/0033-2909.130.4.601. PMID: 15250815; PMCID: PMC1361287.
Sopori, M. Effects of cigarette smoke on the immune system. Nat Rev Immunol 2, 372–377 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1038/nri803