If you feel any pain while walking or running, do not ignore it. This could turn into a heavy and cantankerous problem in no time. Make an appointment with a reputed bunion or plantar wart clinic and check it out immediately. Very often an early visit to the doctor would spare you of heavy expenses and a long recovery time.

Before you chose the doctor for your treatment, check out the following qualifying factors:

1. How long is the clinic functional? The best are almost always the oldest. This is not only because this means the personnel inside would be well experience in most of the problems relating to feet, but also because it would very much care for its old and well established reputation. This does not mean that new clinics cannot offer you a good deal but it would be more difficult to make an opinion based on their performance when it comes to new clinics.

2. What types of foot doctors are they employing? You might not be aware but feet doctors also specialize in many sub-themes. How many specialists are available in the clinic? Are these professionals certified and accredited? Do not shy away from asking all the details pertaining the identity and capability of the doctor to whom you are going to entrust yourself.

3. What Rate of Success Do They Have? Whether they are new or old the rate of success can easily be determined by looking at their recorded medical history. Find out whether people are happy with their treatment and how many walk away from the clinic completely free from any trouble and fully satisfied with the treatment. This is extremely important, for the higher the rate of success the better the quality of doctors and treatment would there be.

4. What are the fees they charge? Look at their chart of fees and compare it with the best of clinics and hospital. They should not compare too bad with these. You can even try negotiating with them for the best possible deal. It is very important that you would have researched well on the Net about this because only then you would be able to truly bargain for a suitable price.

5. Customer satisfaction, is the clinic popular with their patients whether inside or outside? Find out from ex-clients and present clients. Ask for references from the clinic itself and do find out some of the past clients and ask them about their opinion about this particular clinic. Any such feedback should help you decide whether or not you would like to put yourself in the able hands of the good doctor.

6. Do they have tie-ups with financial institutions and banks? Today most clinics have tied-up with banks and financial institutions to ensure that their clients would have the money when they needed it. Very often people leave the treatment mid-way because of lack of adequate finances. Worry no more; the tie-ups are meant to free the person from worries about finances when undergoing any treatment.

The public are now generally aware that antibiotics will only help with bacterial infections. Most chest infections of the upper respiratory system are caused by a virus of which there are over 150 strains.

Although antibiotics were used extensively in the past for a chest infection, they are not normally recommended as they can do more harm than good, as there is now increasing concerns with the side effects of chemical medicine. Studies have shown that antibiotics will not increase the recovery time of an illness in fact, it is known that they can have a detrimental effect on other medication which might have been prescribed, such as Warfarin the blood thinning drug or the contraceptive pill which can make the pill ineffective. Antibiotics are known to disturb the gut flora which affects the healthy populations of bacteria in the body.

The other reason that antibiotics are not now preferred is the knowledge that bacteria have the remarkable ability to mutate becoming resistant to other stronger and ever more sophisticated drugs developed to combat them.

The immune deficiency effect is the concern of modern medicine throughout the world. George Jacoby of the Harvard Medical School, quoted in Laurie Garret’s book, ‘The Coming Plague- Newly Emerging Diseases of the World out of Balance’, Penguin Books-”Bugs are always figuring ways to get around the antibiotics we throw at them, they adapt and come roaring back again”, no wonder, bacteria were around long before man inherited the earth and will always find around the antibiotic effect, and chest infections antibiotics in particular.

Chest infection antibiotics will normally only be considered if you are aged and have a temperature over 38 (100F), or any other condition such as Asthma or a long term condition of the lungs, you are a smoker with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), and if your immune system is compromised as a result of Cancer treatment chemotherapy, or you have diabetes or pleurisy which is the inflammation of the lining of the lungs.

PNEUMONIA

The greatest benefit of antibiotics seemed to be for reducing the risk of pneumonia after a chest infection, particularly in the elderly. This conclusion was as a result of research by I. Peterson and colleagues of The Centre for Infectious Disease and Epidemiology, Department of Primary Care and Population Sciences, University College, London. They found that the greatest benefit of administering antibiotics for pneumonia reduced the risk after a chest infection. The size of this risk increased with the age of the patients. In the over 65 groups, 403 patients per 1000 were at risk of pneumonia, if a chest infection was untreated .This was reduced to 146 per 1000 if treated with antibiotics. Just 39 patients over 65 years would need to be treated with antibiotics to prevent one case of pneumonia compared to 119 patients between the ages of 1 and 64 year.

Their studies taken from records between 1991 and 2001 concluded that antibiotics should only be prescribed in more serious cases of chest infections.

PREVENTION

Your immune system will be stronger and you will be better able to prevent viral and bacterial infections if you lead a healthier lifestyle!