Health & Medical Skin Conditions & Dermatology

How to Heal a Cold Sore Now!

How to heal a cold sore (often times called a fever blister) is what I think of as part two of the cold sore experience.
The first part is when you can feel the tingling as the sore is coming on and the skin cells break until you have a noticeable blister.
The second part of the experience is when the blister breaks, scabs over and the skin starts to heal.
The body will heal by itself, but this post will talk about ways to speed up that process.
Over the past few years I have been reading everything that I can about natural medicine and have concluded that natural is the way to go if it solves your problem.
Therefore, when talking about how to heal a cold sore, I will be talking about methods that don't require a doctor's prescription or for that matter over-the-counter drugs.
In other words, natural cures for cold sores.
Keep It Clean The first rule when learning to treat a sore is to keep it clean.
You certainly don't need a prescription for good old soap and water.
You may have hydrogen peroxide around the house.
Try using that.
The good thing about hydrogen peroxide is that it will help prevent a secondary bacterial infection, which would be the last thing you would need! When drying the area, use something disposable like a paper towel.
You don't want the cycle to start all over again.
Keep the area dry because the virus loves moisture.
I'm assuming that the sore has already broken.
If so, you have to be especially careful not to spread the virus to any other part of your body.
Cover The Sore In order to keep the scab soft and to keep the virus from spreading, you need to keep the sore covered.
You can cover it with something as simple as petroleum jelly or lip balm.
If you don't have one of these, you might try toothpaste.
Some people swear by it! Don't be afraid to try everything.
This may be hard to believe, but honey has anti-viral properties so it makes a good substance for covering up.
Keeping the sore covered is very important at this stage because when the sore breaks, this is when the virus can spread.
Aloe is also a very popular way to keep the sore covered.
Break an Aloe leaf directly over a sore and make sure the gel from the leaf covers the sore completely.
Lysine vs.
Arginine
Lysine for cold sores is a very popular treatment.
Lysine is an amino acid that inhibits the growth of viruses.
Arginine is also an amino acid that promotes the growth of viruses.
To heal a sore properly the level of Lysine in the body should be increased while the level of arginine should be decreased.
Lysine supplements are available.
You should take up to 1,000mg three times a day during an outbreak.
Also you should avoid foods that are high in arginine like chocolate, almonds and peanuts and eat food that are high in Lysine like fish, meat, milk, eggs and cheese.
Lysine lip balm is also available for topical use with some good results reported in a study at the Southern California University.
These good results are somewhat puzzling since the Lysine molecule is too big to enter skin cells easily and most other people say that Lysine only works when taken internally.
Once they heal their sore, some people take 500 mg daily of Lysine as a preventative.
Zinc I'm sure that everyone reading this has heard of Zinc.
This can be used internally or externally, but most people have the best luck using it internally.
Lemon Balm This is a topical cream that proved in a study conducted in Germany that patients who used this, saw their cold sores heal in half the time.
Lemon balm has become a very popular way to treat a cold sore Calcium Most people have a cold sore flare up because of stress.
When you are stressed out, you're adrenal glands start pumping out chemicals that can turn the fluids in your body from alkaline to acid in just a matter of minutes.
This makes an ideal environment for the viruses to thrive.
Calcium is a buffer chemical.
In other words, calcium, which is alkaline, can neutralize more than its weight of an acidic substance.
Some green vegetables are also alkaline.
Try to avoid acidic foods like tomatoes or citrus fruits and you'll be able to heal a cold sore much faster.
The bottom line is that calcium and alkaline foods can not only help to heal a sore, but can also help to prevent future outbreaks.
Caution: Calcium and alkaline foods may boost your immune system.
Talk to your doctor first because you may be taking medications that depend on a weak immune system.
Licorice This is for real.
Licorice has a chemical in it called glycyrrhizic acid that will stop the cold sore virus so that you can start to heal.
The only problem with this is that I'm talking about real licorice.
Not the artificial kind that you find in most candies.
Check the list of ingredients of any product.
You're looking for the words, "licorice mass".
If they're there, you can eat it.
You could also sprinkle licorice powder directly on the sore.
Heat It's common knowledge that you should use ice when you feel a cold sore outbreak coming on, but what a lot of people don't know is that to heal a sore after it has broken open, you should use heat.
Heat draws more blood up to the skin cells.
Viruses don't like the blood and the heat so they will retire back to the nerves.
The increased blood flow also helps the skill cells to rejuvenate.
Isopropyl Alcohol This is a very hazardous treatment so it should only be done under a doctor's supervision.
The alcohol has very strong fumes so a fan should be set up close to the face.
Some kind of goggles should also be worn to keep the fumes out of your eyes.
The alcohol should be applied directly to the sore.
This really hurts at first, but some people say that this really helps to heal their cold sore.
Conclusion If you want to know how to heal a cold sore, there are quite a few techniques out there.
As I said before, I believe that home remedies (natural) for cold sores are the best.
I'm fairly certain that a home remedy for cold sores will work best for you.
Disclaimer I am not a doctor.
Be sure to discuss any planned treatment first with a licensed medical practitioner before beginning any form of treatment.

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