Hey there. So another installment obviously today I want to talk to you about kind of heading into the fall. Kids are going back to school. That means that they're going to be bringing junk home to the parents that they've all shared with each other at school. Parents are going to bring that to work. Then we all share with each other. So I wanted to take a minute and remind you, this is mid-August, but as we get into September and closer into October, we're going to be getting into bronchitis and sore throat and sinus kind of season. We'll have a whole round of allergies in the fall as well. So let's go ahead and talk about what to do to kind of prime your immune system and get it ready for this first, a couple of preventative things. Number one, make sure your vitamin D is where it needs to be.

(00:50)
Vitamin D is hugely important for how your immune system functions, especially in its role of an initial response, anti-inflammatory, anti autoimmune, kind of adding some nuance to the response, so it's just not off the charts. And this can help with allergies as well. So if you want a blood test, just call the office. We'll set it up. It's no big deal. I think it's under 50 bucks. I think it's probably under 40 or around 40. But anyway, your number on a blood test should be ideally according to me, between 70 and 90. Some doctors will say 60 to 90 or 60 to a hundred, but somewhere in that range is kind of the optimal point and we want it absolutely above 55, right? Anything below that and you start to miss some of the major benefits of vitamin D above 30, you're at least getting mineralization out of the gut and into the bloodstream, and that's where the lab is happy.

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Anywhere above 30, but really 60 to a hundred, 70 to 90 somewhere in there is the real sweet spot for people, especially if you have an autoimmune issue. If you're a cancer survivor, if you know that you succumb to all kinds of bronchial crap this time of year, that's what you're going to want to have is you're going to want to have that 60 to 170 to 90 kind of number. So number one, let's get that under control. Number two, you got to eat well and get some sleep. And I know that's not easy. We have kids or back to school, you've got work, I get it. But alcohol, smoking, not getting enough sleep, binging on sugar, those are things that disengage your immune system from the fight. It distracts your immune system from what it's supposed to be doing, which is kind of surveilling for anything coming in that's a threat, right?

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You want to kill it off or get rid of it or neutralize it before it gets a chance to set up shop and do damage. That brings me to the next piece of this, and that is a nasal spray, and we don't sell this at the office. You can get this on Amazon or at the local health food store. Two versions of this. Ideally I'd like to see you do an iodine nasal spray. It's a little bit irritating when you do it, but it doesn't last long. It calms down pretty quickly. If you know, have reactions to iodine, don't even try this one, do the next one. But at the end of the day, a couple of sprays of iodine nasal spray in each nostril kind of let it sit. You don't have to sniff it back too much, just enough to kind of keep it in there.

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Let it stay in there for 30, 45 seconds, maybe a minute, and then if you have to blow your nose, you can. But the idea there is this, a lot of the respiratory infections that we get, they get up into the back of the nose, the nasopharynx up in there, and they kind live there and kind of gather themselves and get some traction and put some roots down for probably 48 hours, maybe 72 hours. That's their incubation period. Then it's kind of like, okay, we got ourselves together. We came up with a game plan. Now we're going to move down farther in the respiratory tract and we're going to cause an infection. If you can kill it off up in there within the first 24 to 48 hours, it never gets a chance to get that foothold. It never gets to move on in any organized manner and cause a real infection.

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A lot of doctors and nurses, people that were dealing with patients during the pandemic a few years ago, they would do this at the end of every shift because we knew that that's where everything incubated and if they could kill it off where it incubated, it never really went anywhere else. It was a very easy way low tech at least to stop this in its tracks or at least diminish your risk of a real infection dramatically. So between vitamin D and doing your iodine nasal spray, there's a good chance you'll sneak through this season without much trouble. My wife's an elementary school teacher. I'm in here in the office seeing sick people. So we do that pretty regularly so that we don't get sick during a season like this. So those are two prevention approaches. Now I said, if you don't react well to iodine, I was going to give you another option.

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You can do a colloidal silver nasal spray as well. I'm not sure that it works as well as the iodine nasal spray. There's less research out there on colloidal silver as a nasal spray, but you can buy a colloidal silver nasal spray, get it in there. It is likely going to do better than not doing a nasal spray, and I don't think that the sinus rinses do nearly as well for what I'm talking about. Now, they're great for getting junk out of the sinuses, but they don't kill much. They mechanically move it out, but they're not killing it. And that's what we're trying to do is we're trying to kill it off before it gets a chance to set up chop and grow. Alright, so that's another big piece of the puzzle. So vitamin D, some sort of nasal spray to kill off whatever's trying to incubate.

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Now, how do you get the rest of your immune system ready for a season like we're about to go into? You can take immune support packets. Those are from a company called Biotics Research. All of the things that you read about during COVID are in there. It's going to have some vitamin D, it's going to have zinc, it's going to have vitamin C, it's going to have a bunch of stuff in there that's supportive of your immune system. It gives your immune system the raw materials it needs to do its job. It's convenient because it comes in a packet. You just do a packet a day and you supporting your immune system. If you get sick, you can go up to two packets a day and add extra support. Just adjust your vitamin D dosage by however much you're getting out of the packet because it is a noticeable amount of vitamin D in there.

(06:47)
Alright? So just be aware. So that's an option. Epi immune is a mushroom based capsule that standard process makes that is very good as kind of a preemptive immune support. It's good at boosting those frontline defenders of our immune systems so that we're better able to react not necessarily to things that we've seen before and have antibodies to, but to things that we haven't seen before. They just happen to be coming in. So Immune does a good job of that. Echinacea also does a good job of that, but good quality. Echinacea number one is hard to find at this point. And number two, it's pretty expensive when you find it right. Echinacea premium is what we use here at the office after a week or so of taking it, it really kind of kicks in and boosts what your immune system is doing. Nuts. Well, I mean it does support your immune system, but it actually delivers information like, Hey, get out there and defend this person.

(07:45)
It's just not cheap, but one or two a day throughout the season can make a big difference. iPlex also standard process. This is another, you could loosely call it a multivitamin for your immune system. It is nutritional support for your immune system. Doesn't necessarily tell it exactly what to do, but it does give it the raw materials. It needs to be responsive and do its job. Astragalus is another one you can do ahead of time, kind of one or two on a daily basis to strengthen and activate your immune system with those frontline defenders, those kind of non-specific defenders to help keep all the bad stuff out. I don't know that I would do a lot of these without also paying attention to the vitamin D and the nasal spray. But if you're not in a high risk environment, you don't want to do the nasal spray, you just want to check your vitamin D and take one or two maybe of these supportive supplements, that would be a great approach to get you ready.

(08:47)
That way if you do end up catching something, your immune system is ready to respond. It'll be a more efficient process with that. Now, when you think you're getting sick, when you come home and you have that first little tickle in your throat or that little sense that I think I'm getting a sore throat or I feel like maybe I'm getting a little bit of a fever immediately, make sure you've done the stuff that you were already supposed to do. Hit an extra shot of the nasal spray, maybe keep one at the office so that midday if you need to, you can hit a shot of the nasal spray. And then we also, standard process has an herbal throat spray. If you can't do the nasal spray, the throat spray is another decent option. It's not going to kill the stuff way up in here where it incubates, but as soon as you start to feel that sore throat, kind of turn that bottle sideways and get it back there on your throat.

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Sometimes that's all you need to knock it out before it turns into anything. But if it starts to turn into something Conga complex, great option. There's a good friend of mine, his name is Aaron Chappa, and he says, when in doubt Congo plex it out. So if you don't know what it is, if you're not sure what you've got, take a bunch of Conex, it's a good chance that it's going to stimulate your immune system enough that it kind of jumpstart to the reaction and hopefully you can get rid of it. But Conex is a great addition. Anytime you have some sort of an infection, Andrographis is a good herbal supplement for almost any infection that you get. I think it's really good for upper respiratory infections, but it's also good for almost any infection that you get. Again, we're not treating the infection, we're not giving you an antibiotic, but we're suggesting something that helps your immune system fight the infection more efficiently.

(10:32)
And our immune systems are better at this than any antibiotic, right? Whether this is, we don't have the equivalent of an antibiotic for viruses, but our immune system has mechanisms by which it can denature the viruses and render them kind of inactive. They're not really alive, so I don't want to say they kill them, but effectively that's how we speak about it and that's kind of what they do anyway. Andrographis good for all of that. Bronch effect. Another good one for any upper respiratory kind of infection. Pulm co, same thing. Sinus forte also good for upper respiratory kind of infections. You can pair these with things like the immune support packets or something like plex. Don't know. I mean, it's not going to hurt to do 'em with epi immune, but adding epi immune once you're already sick probably isn't going to make a big difference.

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You probably want skip once you're sick, but vitamin DI would take throughout, right? If you don't know your blood levels of vitamin D for an adult 5,000 unit a day is probably a meaningful dose. That's not going to get you too high. But sometimes people come in with a vitamin D in the single digits and 5,000 units a day isn't really going to come close to what they need. Or they come in with a vitamin D of 45 and 5,000 units a day is going to make it 65 or 70 and everybody will be happy. You really don't know unless you get a blood test. But if you're not sure, 5,000 units a day is probably a good mid range safe but effective dose, if that makes sense to you guys. So there's a list of what I would recommend that you keep on hand or have available.

(12:11)
Look through your pantry or look through your supplement shelf, see if you've already got any of these. If not, give us a call. We'll get 'em ordered for you if we don't have 'em on the shelf. This is the time of year where it's hard for us to keep some of this in stock because everybody calls up at the last minute and they're like, oh my gosh, kids are going to school. I need one for each of them. I need one for the house. We run out of it pretty quickly. So tell us what you need. We'll get you set up with it. If you want a blood test for your vitamin D level, just let us know. Make sure you get some sleep.

(12:43)
Don't overstress yourself. Go easy on the alcohol, back off on the smoking a little bit. Just don't challenge your system and leave the sugar alone. Don't challenge your system with something else. At the same time you're asking it to be ready to fight infections. Fair enough? I'm going to do a separate video for those of you that have kids with the products in there that are appropriate for the kids. So if you're watching this thinking, what about the kids? Another video. So just go back to the blog, find the video, you'll see reference to it. If not, call the office and we'll email you a link to it or email the office and we'll email you a link to the kids' video if that's what you want. So that's the adult video. Hope you can get that stuff together and hope you're watching this early enough in the season that you can save yourself some trouble. Alright? Otherwise you can review this. Go back and watch it again if you want to torture yourself, but you can get all the names written down and everything. The name of the Iodine nasal spray that I use is called NasoMin, N-A-S-O-M-I-N. You can get it on Amazon or in CVS or something. There are other ones out there. Pick one that you like. I like the Nain. Pretty clean, pretty simple. Works well. That's the one I use. Alright, you guys have a great one. I'll see you on the next video.