Common cold is common. Everyone definitely has had more or less times of common cold during his/her life. Some people choose to stay at home and just have a rest and others may have to take pain killer, or aspirin-like medicine. Here we introduce some tips used by ordinary Chinese when they have common cold.

(1). Carrot soup

Material: Yellow carrot (not the white color carrot).

Preparation: wash the carrot, chop into small pieces, cook in water for 10 to 20 min.

How to use: Drink the soup. It is useful for those who feel cold/chilly. It is better to drink before going to bed. During night, you may have mild sweat and feel much better next morning!

(2). Chinese green onion

Material: Chinese green onion (Allium). Use its white stem. Fresh ginger 15 g; rice 100g.

Preparation: Add rice into water to boil for 30 min or until the rice is ready to eat. Add chopped Chinese green onion and the fresh ginger into the rice soup for several min.

How to use: Drink the soup. It is useful for those who feel cold.

(3). Chinese green onion and garlic soup

Material: Chinese green onion, 500g; garlic 250g.

Preparation: Chop the green onion into pieces; peer the garlic, chop it too. Add into 2000ml water to boil for 10 to 20 min.

How to use: Drink the soup. Three times a day. It is used also for prevention of flu.

(4). Chinese green onion and walnut kennel

Material: Chinese green onion, 25g; walnut kennel, 25g; fresh ginger, 25g; green tea leaves, 15g. 

Preparation: Grind the onion, kennel, and the ginger into mud, mix with tea leaves and 500 ml water. Boil for 10 to 20 min. 

How to use: Drink the soup all once. Cover with tight and have a sleep.

Note: the above formula is used for Cold-type common cold. People feel cold, or chilly, with or without hot/fever, with or without headache or little cough. It is not suitable if one feel only fever but no cold at all. It is neither good for those who is easy to have sweat before the common cold.

In Traditional Chinese Medicine, this type of common cold belongs to Cold type and need some sweating therapy (to expel the Cold out of body with sweat). The commonly used herb formula is Ma-huang tang. Tang means formula.

If one has tight shoulders, pain in front head, stiff nose and sinus, or source on the back of eye, we use Ge-geng tang.

If one has fever and cold shift (sometimes cold and again fever, then cold again), with bloating upper stomach, nausea, ache in the side of neck, head or body, or with kind of annoyed feeling, we may use Xiao-chai-hu tang.

If one normally has sweat very easily, and this time with the common cold, he/she feels cold, sweat, with or without fever, with or without small joints pain, we may use Gui-zhi tang. People who need such Gui-zhi tang is usually thin and weak, and has frequent allergic reaction history.

If one is very weak, or has had long time illness, or just had big surgery stress, or normally has cold feet and/or hands, with or without heavy pain in joints, we may use Ma-huang Fu-zi Xi-xin tang.

Prevention of common cold/flu

You can add vinegar in a pot (better with a clay, not a metal in material). Heat the pot to cause the vapor of the vinegar and let it fill into the room. For cold people, instead of using cold vaccine injection, we recommend to drink Ma0huan Fu-zi Xi-xing tang. It gives you energy (physically and mentally), warm you up, and keep you alert (not drowsy during daytime, neither poor sleep at night).

Treatment of common cold in the Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) depends on the clinic manifestation, people’s feeling, their body constitution, the season and so on. We do not give you headache herbs if you have headache; give you fever herbs, if you have fever; give you cough herbs, if you have cough – TCM is not a one-plus-one herb accumulation medical system. We do not use the same herbs formula for everyone if they complain to have a “common cold”.

If you catch cold and need get rid of the common cold as soon as possible – since you need to pass a job interview, to participate a professional conference, participate a college exam,…to meet your girl/boy friend… come to a TCM doctor. They should be able to solve your common cold dramatically within one hour!

Although more and more people realize the importance and usefulness of the Traditional Chinese Medicine – especially its acupuncture and herbal therapy – some people still suspect and hesitate to take herbs. For those people, it is recommended to try a suction cupping therapy.

You can use suction cupping for the treatment of common cold as well as flu. The most common place to put the suction cups is on your upper back (Fig. 1). Leave the cups for 10 to 20 min, or until you can see the skin color within the cups turns dark.