How Doctors Prevent Flu
Ever wonder how doctors and nurses prevent flu? After all, doctors and nurses are surrounded by people with high fevers and the flu, coughing at them in small exam rooms.
The answers may surprise you – and mainly because some of the most important preventative steps are so simple.
Wash Your Hands
(or Use Hand Sanitizer)
This is the number one thing doctors say they do and recommend for others. Doctors wash their hands before and after every patient they see. In fact, they wash or sanitize pretty much every time they touch someone or something other than their personal items.
Use warm water and soap and scrub for at least 20 seconds. Use a paper towel to dry your hands and to turn off the faucet, especially in public bathrooms.
Keep Your Hands
Away from Your Face
People constantly rub their eyes, their nose or touch their mouth. Doctors and nurses swear that keeping their hands away from their face is one of the most critical ways to avoid getting infected.
Computer keyboards, telephones, doorknobs, pens that are given to you when you sign for a credit card purchase or in a doctor’s office – all of these are surfaces that have great potential for harboring germs.
Another insider tip: Be careful with lip balm. Use lip balm in a tube during flu season as opposed to something that you use your finger to apply to your lips.
Get Your Flu Shot
The flu shot won’t prevent flu… but it will hopefully prevent you from dying (or getting hospitalized) from the flu.
Many people don’t get the flu shot because they feel they have gotten the flu from it in years past. But the flu shot can not – never, ever – give you the flu. Why? Because the flu shot contains an inactivated vaccine made of killed virus. Because the viruses in this vaccine are killed (inactivated), the shot simply can’t cause you to get the flu.
People can develop other symptoms, though, that make them think the flu shot made them sick.
Live Healthy
Practice good healthy habits. Get plenty of sleep, exercise regularly, drink plenty of fluids, eat a nutritious diet and manage your stress. There is no better way to prevent flu – or to prevent other illness – other than living a healthy life rich in nutritious food and exercise.
Sneezing and coughing is one of the quickest ways to spread a virus. If you see someone coughing and sneezing, if it’s possible, move away.
Natural Ways to Stay Healthy
Although no natural remedy has been proven to prevent flu specifically, a number of natural or complementary approaches have been shown to help with other viruses that cause colds, such as zinc lozenges, Neti-Pot, and other supplements like Vitamin C, Echinacea, garlic and American Ginseng.
If you or someone in your family has sudden onset of high fever, whole body aches, chills and feels generally awful, see your provider right away.
