Homemade Sea Salt Nasal Spray

If you suffer from nasal allergies or frequent sinus infections you know you will try nearly anything to get relief. Commercial nasal spritzes, both medicated and non-medicated, sell well, but don’t always help very much. Your doctor may have performed an irrigation to clean out your sinuses, and this can make you feel much better, but it’s expensive and sometimes more invasive than you’re comfortable with. Fortunately, you can perform a similar procedure yourself at home.

Kits

• You can find a few different brands of sinus washes at your local pharmacy or health food store as well as online. You can choose from special squeeze bottles, bulb syringes and neti pots (which look like small watering cans) for the delivery method. Some people even choose not to use one of the regular delivery methods and simply sniff the solution up from a spoon. Complete sinus-rinsing kits range in price from about eight to 10 dollars. They come with a couple of dozen packets of saline mix that you add to distilled water, and you can purchase refills. If you use this wash daily, you will soon spend quite a bit of money on the refills. Fortunately, you have the ingredients to make the spray solution in your kitchen.

Homemade Spray

• Look at the ingredients list on any nasal spray or wash and you will see sodium phosphate and sodium bicarbonate. Basically these are non-iodized table salt and baking soda.

  Purchase a good quality sea salt or pickling salt at your grocer or health food store, along with a box of baking soda. For a single dose, add ½ teaspoon of the salt and ½ teaspoon of the soda to 8 oz. warm distilled water. Don’t use cold water or regular unfiltered tap water because these will cause a bad burning sensation and possibly a brief headache. Lean over a sink and either squeeze or pour a small amount of the solution into one nostril. Let the liquid run freely out the other nostril and repeat with the other side. You may want to try sniffing a little while the solution is in your sinuses to help wash them more thoroughly. Go back and forth until the water is gone. Blow your nose gently, but don’t let the water get pushed into your ear canal.

  If you prefer, you can mix up a batch of the dry ingredients and store it in an airtight container. Put ½ cup of salt and ½ cup of soda into the container and store at room temperature. When you are ready to use some, measure out one teaspoon into warm water.