Quick & Handy Home Remedies: Find practical, affordable ways to deal with some of life's most common ailments, proving that getting back to the basics has its reward. Only $16.95 +s/h
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Q. For about 20 years, I suffered with annual bouts of poison ivy, even though I knew how to identify it and never touched the stuff. Finally I found a homeopathic remedy that has made my life much better every summer. It's called Rhus tox. I take two small pills under my tongue twice daily for a week in March, then again for a week in April.
It's an infinitesimally small dose (because it's homeopathic) and it works like an oral vaccine. You take it before the leaves come out, so the timing depends on your climate. The hardest part is remembering to take it in the spring.
If I am exposed to poison ivy in the course of heavy weeding in my garden, I may get one or two small poison ivy blisters. They don't spread and they go away quickly.
I used to need steroid shots, prednisone pills and cortisone creams a couple of times a summer. Tecnu soap helps, but this has been a godsend.
As a nurse practitioner, I knew homeopathic medicine would be diluted enough to be safe. I doubted it would be effective, but it has been very helpful for me.
A. We appreciate your testimonial. The efficacy of homeopathy, like that of home remedies, can't be explained scientifically. As you noted, it should be safe. Avoiding poison ivy whenever possible is always the most effective solution.
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I too suffered every summer with poison ivy. Only steroids would clear it up. When lotions weren't relieving the itching I wiped the spots with rubbing alcohol. It helped. Since then as soon as I come in from the yard I use a paper towel and wipe down with alcohol. I haven't had any problems since.
A relative was extremely sensitive to poison ivy - so much so that he was told that a major case of it could kill him. He tried a homeopathic remedy for it and THAT almost killed him instead. It seems that at least some of these remedies contain very small doses of poison ivy itself. For this reason, people who have a severe sensitivity to poison ivy should probably avoid any homeopathic remedies for it completely.
There is a plant - jewel weed that has worked very well for me when I have been exposed. I even went so far as to try it in selected parts of my exposed skin and it does work. I take the fresh leaves and stems of jewel weed and puree it in a blender with a little water then put it on the exposed portions of my skin for about twenty minutes then wash everything off carefully with cool water. (See the washing instructions that come with Tecnu.)
The problem is that the jewel weed ts very perishable - it must be used fresh, and anything you use to help prevent infection, like heating it or adding alcohol, will destroy its anti-poison ivy characteristics. Therefore it should not ever be used on broken skin.
Visit the naturalist at your local nature museum for help in identifying jewel weed - it's not hard to recognize once you've been taught how.
Rhus tox has been around for ever. I can remember taking it as a kid over 60 years ago. Glad to hear it's still on the market.
When we were kids ('50's), my Mom used to give my brother and me IVY TOX (drops). Eventually, we showed no symptoms to exposure to this nasty weed...sounds very much like this RHUS TOX sub-lingual, in a different form.
Does anyone know if one can "store" in your body the rash-causing essence of poison ivy? I had a very bad poison ivy exposure years ago and to this day I occasionally break out in a rash in some of the same places I did that first time...but without any exposure at all.
Hi, I too used to be able to buy the product mentioned above but it seems it is not available here. Now I am only able to get something IF I break out from Poison Ivy. It was great for me.
A product that worked wonders for me and cleared my systemic reaction to Poision Oak was Zanfel. It stopped the itching in 30seconds (just as it claimed), and within a few days the oozing blistering rash over 90% of my body was basically gone. Zanfel can be found at Walgreens (and possibly other pharmacies). It cost about $35-$40 per tube. One tube will do it, it goes a long way. If I ever get Poisoin Oak/Ivy/or Sumac again I will use this product. Zanfel is a Godsend. I now keep a tube in my house at all times, just incase.
http://www.zanfel.com/help/
I am systemically allergic to poison ivy and had a severe reaction last summer. The exposure was from a pair of leather gloves I didn't know had been exposed. I made the mistake of taking the homeopathic remedy during outbreak instead of prophylacticly and wound up with inflammation in my throat and inner eyelids. I learned from the Nurse Practitioner who treated me to use the rhus tox tablets at the beginning of the season.
My brother is also allergic but not systemically. He crushes fresh comfrey leaves and combines with aloe vera to make a salve that clears his rashes within a day or two.
I grew up drinking Ivy Tox drops in water every spring. This was in the early 60s. My dad worked for the local power company and they gave this product to their linemen. I don't know why this preventive treatment is not more widely known, particularly for landscapers, gardeners, etc. At the time I don't think the medical establishment recognized this as legitimate. With Ivy Tox I still got a few spots, but nothing like the weeping, blistery stuff of my first exposures, the kind of reaction that looked so nasty my school wanted to send me home.
Years ago, flower of sulfur was the remedy. Sulfur "field dressings" were used on wounds during WWI. Hoping your suggestion o0f Rhus Tox works.
I AM ON MY SECOND COURSE THIS YEAR. Am in the blistering stage. Approx.
4th day. Hopeful your suggestion works. Shear misery ....
I don't believe the sulfur is available any more. (Componemt of Gun Powder) It's messy and difficult to work with. Warm water with soaks several times a day. But it worked. The warm water soothed the inflammation. The sulfur healed. Gets into everything ... In the thirtys it was a god send. Grandmother healed her husband when he inhaled smoke from burning it. Doctors gave up hope. She stuck him in a tub of hot of water. Bathed him twice a day to healing him. Also inhaled the vapors. This was in the late teens or early twentys. I still have a partial "tin" of it from the 40's. If I have to, it's back to basics....
She used leaches & was hell on wheels with a base ball bat against snakes eating her chickens...That's for another time ... g.c.