What is the difference between a cold caused by wind and heat?

Colds can occur in any season and in any group of people. Colds are not serious illnesses, but they do occur. Colds are divided into many categories, including wind-cold colds and wind-heat colds.

What is a cold?

Wind-cold cold: It often occurs in cold seasons, such as winter, late autumn and early spring, and is a disease caused by the cold evil.

Symptoms: mild fever, severe chills, no sweating, headache and body aches, clear nasal discharge, cough, no redness or swelling in the throat, pale red tongue, and tight pulse.

Treatment method: Use pungent and warm herbs to relieve the symptoms. Commonly used Chinese patent medicines include Xiaoer Zhibao Pills, etc.

Dietary recommendations: Eat foods that dispel cold and induce sweating. The staple food can be scallion porridge, chili oil noodles, and tea can be ginger brown sugar tea, ginger and basil tea, brewed with boiling water, and the patient will recover after sweating.

What is Wind-heat Cold?

Wind-heat cold: It often occurs in warm seasons, such as spring, early summer and early autumn. It is a disease caused by wind-heat evil spirits.

Symptoms: high fever, mild chills, sweating or little sweating, headache, nasal congestion, sore throat, red tongue, and rapid pulse (i.e., faster pulse).

Treatment method: Use pungent and cool herbs to relieve the symptoms. Commonly used Chinese patent medicines include Children's Heat-clearing Oral Liquid, Children's Chixu Qingre Granules, Children's Cold Granules (Oral Liquid), etc.

Dietary suggestions: Eat foods that clear away heat and reduce internal heat. Green bean porridge can be used as the staple food. Tea can be made by brewing 5 honeysuckle flowers with boiling water, several cups a day. Vegetables can be eaten with cold green bean sprouts and winter melon soup. Watermelon, pears, and apples are also acceptable. It is best to avoid eating too much fish and meat or other tonic products.

How to distinguish between wind-cold cold and wind-heat cold?

So what are the differences between a cold caused by wind and heat? Here, I will teach you some simple ways to distinguish them:

Seasonal aspect: Generally speaking, in autumn and winter, most of children's colds are caused by wind-cold, that is, they are attacked by wind-cold, so they should be treated as wind-cold colds during this period; in summer, it is generally easy to have wind-heat colds, that is, exogenous wind-heat.

The color and texture of sputum: Generally, colds and coughs will produce sputum. If the child's sputum is thin and white, it means that it is a cold caused by wind and cold; if the cough has thick sputum, which is yellow and thick, it means that it is probably caused by a cold caused by wind and heat. Many children cannot spit, so parents should let their children try to learn to spit more often. It will be much better if they spit out.

Do you have a sore throat? Generally speaking, a cold caused by wind and cold will not cause a sore throat, just a dry cough, but no redness or swelling. If the throat is more sore, with redness and swelling, and pain when swallowing, it means you have a cold caused by wind and heat.

Regarding runny nose: When a child has a cold, they usually have a runny nose. If the runny nose is clear, it generally means that the child has a cold due to wind and cold; if the runny nose is thicker and a little yellow, it means that the child has a cold due to wind and heat. Note that sometimes, the runny nose starts out as clear, but then turns into yellow runny nose, which means that the child has inflammation.

Whether there is dry mouth: If the mouth is not dry when you have a cold, it means it is a cold caused by wind and cold; if the mouth is dry and the child always wants to drink water and always feels thirsty, it means it is a cold caused by wind and heat.

The degree of coldness: Generally speaking, people with wind-cold colds will be more susceptible to coldness and have a higher body temperature, while people with wind-heat colds will not be so susceptible to coldness, or may not be susceptible to coldness. However, children may not show this, so you should pay more attention to whether they are shivering.

Whether there is sweating: Generally speaking, children with wind-cold colds do not sweat and do not sweat easily; while children with wind-heat colds often sweat profusely. This can easily distinguish between wind-cold and wind-heat colds.

Choose medicine by ingredients. Most of the familiar ones are wind-heat cold medicines.

It may be easy to distinguish between wind-heat cold and wind-cold cold, but no matter which kind of cold it is, it can make people feel uncomfortable for several days. Some people use wind-cold cold medicine even though they know it is wind-heat cold, which makes the cold more serious. Experts teach us how to distinguish wind-cold cold medicine from wind-heat cold medicine.

Cold medicine: Cold medicine often contains words such as "removing wind", "dispersing cold", "wind and cold". Chinese patent medicine for cold often contains ephedra, cinnamon twig, radix scutellariae, angelica sinensis, perilla leaf, ginger, nephrite and saposhnikovia root as main ingredients.

Wind-heat cold medicine: Wind-heat cold medicine often carries the words "clearing heat" and "detoxification". Familiar Chinese medicines such as honeysuckle, lianshao, isatis root, chrysanthemum, mulberry leaf, mint, scutellaria, coptis root, and isatis indigotica are often the main ingredients of wind-heat cold medicine.