When I help a baby with a cold at my practice, then I approach this in two ways.
First, I strengthen the baby’s immune system.
And second, I help the baby relieve the symptoms of the cold until the body has gotten rid
of the cold.
Yes, so in this video, we are first gonna show you two ways to strengthen your baby’s
immune system.
Next, we are gonna walk you through a couple of tools and natural remedies to relieve your
baby’s cold symptoms.
And then, we are also going to look at a couple of alternative medicine treatments and remedies
to help a baby with a cold. Right.
This is Nathalie, a pregnancy and birth consultant and TCM therapist, and that’s Mathias a
researcher and science geek and on this channel we help mommies and their baby naturally and
science-based!
So, how can we help a baby with a cold?
Before we start, please note that this video is about helping a baby with a cold.
But it is not intended to prevent or treat any diseases, like the flu, right?
So, whenever your baby suffers from a disease, we recommend consulting with your provider!
With that said, let us first look at the two most important ways to strengthen a baby’s
immune system:
Initially, your baby’s immune system is only just developing.
That’s one reason why babies and toddlers are prone to catching colds easily.
The good news is though that feeding your baby breast milk can help in two ways.
First, human milk contains lots of biologically active components which can help develop the baby’s
immune system.
Yes.
And second, breast milk also contains lots of nutrients, such as vitamins and other components,
such as maternal antibodies, which protect the baby from infections. Right.
So, the best thing that you can do to help your baby with a cold is breastfeeding your
baby or bottle feeding with breast milk that you expressed.
While breastmilk is the best possible nutrition for your baby, it has two shortcomings.
First, obviously not every woman is able to breastfeed or to express milk.
And second, breastmilk normally does not contain enough vitamin D. But no matter if you breastfeed
or not, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that infants and children should
receive an additional dose of vitamin D per day.
Right.
We tell you how much vitamin D a baby needs depending on age in the description below
this video because this allows us to change the number in case the authorities change
it. Right?
Now, the reason why they recommend Vitamin D supplementation is because it was shown
in scientific studies that Vitamin D deficiency can lead to impaired growth, developmental delays
and other problems.
On top of that, other scientific studies also concluded that vitamin D seems to influence
the immune system of the baby in a positive way.
And because of that, many doctors also recommend vitamin D supplementation to strengthen the
baby’s immune system.
But it’s always good idea to talk with your provider first before you administer Vitamin D drops
to your baby, right?
Right.
So, how do you administer vitamin D drops to your baby?
Well, you can either place the drops directly in your baby’s mouth.
Just make sure that you don’t aim for the back of your baby’s throat, okay?
Aim for the cheeks!
Right.
What we did when our son was little was putting the vitamin D drops directly on the nipple
before breastfeeding.
And finally, if you are bottle feeding, just mix the drops into with the milk.
Okay, so, now that understand how to support your baby’s immune system, let us now look
at how to relieve some of your baby’s cold symptoms.
If your baby has a stuffed nose, then one natural remedy that could help is a saline nasal spray.
The results of scientific studies in terms of the exact benefits of a saline nasal spray
are mixed.
However, many of those studies come to the conclusion that it can help with certain nose-related
symptoms of a cold.
Yes.
The purpose of a saline solution is to thin out the mucus in order to allow the nose to
clear out and to ease congestion.
And a big advantage here is that it is also suitable for newborns.
But as always, we recommend talking with a qualified healthcare provider first, okay?
Using a bulb syringe may seem like a disgusting idea to remove mucus from a baby’s nose, right?
But then again, as a parent, you get used to all kinds of things you may found disgusting
earlier in your life.
Yes, so the idea here is that you compress the bulb, insert it into your baby’s nose
and then release the compression in order to suck away the mucus from your baby’s
nose.
It is certainly nothing that will make your baby healthier.
But at least it can help relieve some of those nasty cold symptoms.
Okay, this method is not science-based at all, meaning, that there are no scientific
studies which have investigated if onions can really do anything about a cold.
However, it’s something that we work with and the feedback we receive is really very
very positive.
Yes.
So, the theory is that the components that are released when freshly cutting an onion
can help with nose-related as well as respiratory symptoms of a cold.
Yes. But just to be clear: an onion cannot heal a cold but it could help at least relieve some of the
symptoms of a cold until your baby’s body got rid of the cold by itself.
Right.
All you need to do is roughly chop an onion and put it somewhere next to your baby’s
crib during the night.
Just make sure that your baby is not able to reach it with their hands, okay?
Onion socks are just another great natural cold remedy.
Just keep in mind that they are not suitable for babies under the age of 6 months and in
case of injuries on the soles, right?
Yes.
All you need to do is slice an onion and put some of the slices on your baby’s soles.
Use something to fix them, like a bandage but don’t cover the toes.
And you also need two very warm socks.
So, it’s very important that your baby has really warm feet, okay?
And then you just leave it there for about 3-4 hours or over-night.
The idea here is that the onions improve the blood circulation of the soles which is supposed
to improve the blood circulation of the mucus membranes of the respiratory tract.
So, it’s a reflexive effect (i.e. related to reflexology).
Yes.
But again, this is not science based at all because there are no scientific studies about
it.
But the feedback that we receive is really really great! Right.
Two more natural remedies to help a baby with the symptoms of a cold are onion tea and thyme
tea.
Both teas are well known cold remedies which is why we often combine both, onions and thyme
to one tea.
In our experience, this can be a super effective natural remedy to relieve some of the symptoms
of a cold, including a cough.
If you want to know how to prepare it, have a look at the recipe in the description below
this video. Yes.
That said, please keep in mind that as long as your baby is younger than 9 months of age,
you have to be very careful with offering your baby too much additional water or tea next
to breast- or bottle feeding.
That’s because the additional fluids could dilute normal sodium levels in your baby’s
body which could cause all kinds of troubles, including seizures and coma, right? You can
find more information about water intoxication in babies in the description below this video.
Yes.
By the way: you can increase the effect of the tea by adding either thyme honey or fir
honey.
Just make sure that you only add the honey once the tea has cooled off to less than 38
degrees Celsius (100.4 degrees Fahrenheit) as otherwise, you destroy the enzymes of the honey.
Yes. Moreover, keep in mind that a baby can only have honey once the baby is at least 12 months
old, right?
Before the age of 12 months, a baby’s digestive system is not able to cope with the bacteria
which honey can sometimes contain. Right.
With that said, let’s now look at three alternative medicine tools and remedies
to help a baby with a cold.
Persimmon puree is yet another great natural cold remedy.
However, there are no scientific studies about its effect.
But it is a remedy which is used in Traditional Chinese Medicine.
Yes.
In TCM, persimmons are well known to help a baby with the symptoms of a cold.
They can be particularly helpful in case of a sore throat, a congested nose with yellowish
discharge as well as persistent phlegm which is difficult to expectorate.
Just keep in mind that persimmon puree is only suitable for your baby once you have
introduced solids, okay? Yes.
And if you want to know how to prepare persimmon puree, check out the description below this
video!
For mild forms of a cold, we normally use 2 acupressure points to help the baby with the
cold.
Let us quickly show you how to find them.
The first acupressure point is located on the inside of your baby’s feet.
The best thing to do to find the point is to palpate along the side of the feet until
you feel a bony prominence.
Right after the bony prominence there is a little depression.
This is your acupressure point.
Massage the point regularly for about 10 seconds on both feet!
For the next point, you first need to find the fold between your baby’s palm and wrist!
Next, find the tendon of your baby’s thumb!
You might have to hold your baby’s thumb and move it around a bit in order to find
the tendon.
The acupressure point you are looking for is the intersection where the tendon of the
thumb and the fold between the palm and wrist meet.
Massage the point regularly for about 10 seconds on both hands.
If a baby suffers from a persistent cold, we apply Shonishin.
This is a pediatric baby massage treatment which involves stroking techniques, as well
as acupressure and tapping techniques.
In our experience, this is the most effective way to help a baby with a cold.
In fact, at the practice, Nathalie now almost exclusively works with Shonishin, next to
nutritional things to help a baby with all kinds of things.
And because of that, we teach Shonishin in one of our online course.
So if you like, sign up for it!
The link should pop up now.
But you can also find it in the description below this video.
Right.
If you have found this video helpful, we would be super grateful if you could leave us a
like!
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