Clearing the Air Around Influenza

The start

It starts with a tickly sore throat, or a feeling of being unwell, aches and pains, cough, chills, stuffed nose, or raised temperature. These symptoms could come singularly, together or in a sequence without a fixed pattern. After a few days, you may get a stuffy nose and feel washed out or better. Or you may get worse, have difficulty climbing stairs, and develop a terrible cough. 

In this picture are symptoms (felt by the ill person) and signs (a fever, measured by a health care professional, considered an objective finding). In medicine, such a mixture of symptoms and signs without a clear cause is called a clinical syndrome. If a cause is found, the syndrome becomes a specific disease. The vast majority of these episodes are benign and self-limiting and resolve at home or with your GP’s or practice nurse ministrations: take fluids, keep warm, take some paracetamol/acetaminophen, rest or some folk remedies such as spicy chicken broth, which may be more acceptable to people of differ…