Vicks on Your Feet for a Cough?

[jellibeans]

Have you ever heard of this? I am kinda remembering someone mentioning this to me. It is supposed to help a cough during the night. Put Vicks on your feet and cover with socks.

[WolfpackMom]

Yes, that idea is given out on here a lot. We do it for DS when he has a cold, seems to help - if anything it can't hurt! :)

[ohsara430]

Yes we do it here, for all of us when we have a cold.

[TwinFoxes]

Why feet and not the chest? Is it because it might irritate the skin on your chest?

[s7714]

I always hear a lot of people claiming this works, but never tried it myself. There was a comment about it in the recent On Health newsletter I get (I think it's from Consumer Reports maybe? Not sure as my mom gifted the sub to me.). They said there's no medical or physical reasoning that would justify Vicks working by putting it on a person's feet and all that it might do by putting it there is kill off foot fungus. :shrug: I know a lot of people that swear by it though!

[BelleoftheBallFlagstaff]

The skin on the bottom of your feet is quite porous. I use a Vicks type rub from a local shop, no petroleum though.

[m448]

I've read that vicks in general can be irritating to the airways so years ago we switched to eucalyptus eo in the med cup of a hot vaporizer not on the skin. the eucalyptus eo seems to be cleansing for the air and the combo with the vaporizer is the only thing thay allows a congested coughing baby or kid to sleep soundly all night. Starts working in minutes (just be sure to close doors to the room to keep the warm moist air in.

[Melbel]

We have had good luck with it (DS and DD1 have asthma and get some nasty coughs). Whatever works!

[kmm]

My husband put it on my daughter's feet and it caused another problem.....she won't go to sleep now without us putting it on her feet! It's been months but she thought it was so funny to have her feet rubbed, that she wants it every night. We just use lotion or Aquaphor and she now has the softest feet of any 2 year old I know!

[zoestargrove]

that's funny because my boys love having lotion rubbed on their feet before bed too! I once rubbed lavender scented lotion on my son when he was having trouble sleeping and told him that lavender is known to help you sleep.