Here’s an informative, hilariously corny video about the dangers of letting your children play on the carpet — home to 100,000 to 10,000,000 dreaded dust mites. It’s actually an ad for a children’s double-decker play table, but there’s much to learn from their message!
Now that you’ve begun your spring cleaning, take the opportunity to debug your mattress. Here are three easy steps from an article on CNN.com about deep cleaning:
Step 1: Wash your mattress pad in hot water every two months. If you don’t have one, you should get one. Mattress pads, especially the antiallergenic variety (i.e. CleanRest), significantly inhibit mites’ proliferation.
Step 2: Using your vacuum’s wand or upholstery attachment and a high setting, carefully go over the entire surface of the mattress, paying special attention to indented or buttoned areas, where dust lodges.
Step 3: Every other time you vacuum the mattress, flip it over and rotate it so the head moves to the foot. And vacuum newly exposed sides, too. This cuts down on uneven wear and helps keep mites at bay.
We talk about dust mites often. Daily, almost. But we haven’t shared too many pictures of the little critters that share the pillow that you lay your head on each night. So, without much adieu, we present… the dust mite.
If you can minimize the dust in your home, you can minimize the risk of eczema, according to a study published in the Journal of Investigative Dermatology. Why’s that? Well, dust is comprised of dirt, fibers and allergens from dust mites and cockroaches—the latter two can damage the protective layer of the skin. This increases your risk of eczema inflammation. So, here are some tips pulled from The Open Press newswire about minimizing dust in your home:
• Make sure you don’t leave food out to attract roaches. However, those who live in an environment prone to roaches may have to take extra care. Try boric acid. If you buy it in chalk form it’s easy to run the chalk along the joins of cupboards (all of them) and along the floor/wall joins. It’s much more effective than the usual roach killer products, and you don’t load up your house with toxic chemicals that will exacerbate your dry skin or eczema even further.
• Dust mites are rather more difficult to eliminate as they are virtually invisible. However, vacuuming once a week in the spots that build up dust—behind the couch or refrigerator, in stuffed animals, carpet, furniture, pillows, mattresses and blankets—will help. If you are extremely sensitive, you might want to encase some of them in hypo-allergenic dust covers.
• No matter how dust-free your environment appears to be it’s almost possible to completely eliminate it, which is why you also need a shielding lotion. A good shielding lotion bonds with the outer layer of the skin to form a protective layer that locks in moisture and prevents the absorption of irritants and allergens. With that protection in place, the skin can heal itself.
The Environmental Protection Agency is constantly reminding us that the air inside our home can be more polluted than the air outside. Do something about it! Lennox Industries, manufacturers of heating and air conditioning systems, has five tips for cleaner indoor air:
1. Wash sheets weekly in hot water—at least 150 degrees, which will kill dust mites that can lead to allergic reactions and respiratory problems.
2. Vapors from common household cleaning supplies can cause a variety of health issues. Store them outside or in a tightly sealed container.
3. Change your air filter once a month. It can prolong the life of the heating and cooling system. Look for a pleated air filter with a MERV (Minimum Efficiency Reporting Value) rating of 10 or higher.
4. Run the right type of vacuum. Vacuums can sometimes distribute more allergens into the air than they pick up. Be sure to use a vacuum with a high-efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filter, which will trap small particles like dust.
5. Clean hard surfaces. Switch to common household items like baking soda, borax, cornstarch or white vinegar to clean hard surfaces.
A year ago, Chicago Tribune writer Karen Klages began researching the ways that we can make a difference by living green. The project was called “Living the Green Life,” and Karen and others interviewed engineers, chemists, environmentalists, recycling experts, governmental agencies, medical professionals, appliance makers, master gardeners and readers to build a database of information that can help us make a difference. On Tuesday, January 22, the Tribune published a list of 50 tips based off the knowledge they gained over the past year.
One of the tips was about how to save money and energy while doing your laundry. The first sentence reads “get over the idea that you need hot water to kill the nasties.” It contradicts the idea that you need to wash you sheets and pillows in hot water to kill dust mites and subdue other allergens. According to the article, washing your laundry in cool or cold water and detergent is just as effective for getting rid of pollen and mold spores, and it saves energy. However, heat is required to kill dust mites and cleanse animal dander, but you can use your dryer for that. The research led to the belief that washing your clothes in cold water and drying them at 120 to 130 degrees is just as effective as washing with hot water. The added bonus is a clear conscious and a heavier wallet.
To read the other 49 green-living tips from the article, click here.
Dust is a combination of thousands of different ingredients, including hair, skin cells, dirt and rock particles, clothing fibers, mold spores and pollen. Research conducted by the Environmental Protection Agency discovered that dust may even contain toxic chemicals, including traces of lead and flame retardants. All of that said, it’s a no-brainer why having a dusty home can be harmful to you and your family.
The Chicago Tribune offered a list of five ways to reduce the amount of dust that you have in your home. Read up:
1. Replace old rugs
Carpets shed fiber and collect dust particles. Every time you walk on it, you knock particles into the air; they circulate throughout the house on drafts and air currents, including those from forced-air furnaces. In addition, as synthetic carpets and pads deteriorate over time, they become brittle and break into fine particles, contributing considerably to dust. Replace old carpet and pads, or, when possible, remove them and use hard-surface flooring and area rugs.
2. Capture it
Don’t worry about cleaning ductwork unless you’ve had remodeling or construction work done recently, or it’s never been cleaned before.
Cleaning with a vacuum can help control dust, but if you don’t use one with a HEPA filter you’ll simply spread around the dust. A central vacuum that discharges outdoors also works well.
The standard filter on a forced-air furnace doesn’t do much to capture household dust. Replace it with a higher-efficiency pleated filter.
3. Show ‘em the door
Place a mat outside entry doors so people can clean shoes and boots before entering. Better yet, remove shoes and especially boots, and leave them on a mat near the door.
Put outdoor clothing in closets and keep the door closed.
When possible, use cabinets and display shelves with doors rather than open shelving.
4. Dust in the wind
Beware of ultrasonic humidifiers. If you are using tap water instead of distilled water in the humidifier, it will release fine minerals or light-colored “dust” into the home.
Limit candle burning, as it releases fine particles of soot into the air.
5. Cleaning chores
Furry pets shed hair and dander. Launder their sleeping areas frequently, and bathe and groom animals regularly.
Damp-mop or damp-wipe all smooth surfaces weekly. Don’t forget those easily overlooked areas such as window sills, door frames and baseboards.
For awhile now we’ve been recommending washing your sheets in very hot water to kill dust mites—for those of you who may not have trusted that advice, here’s some supporting information:
A study conducted in South Korea testing this same practice (researchers washed the sheets at 140 degrees Fahrenheit) yielded 100 percent efficacy. The same test done at only 104 degrees Fahrenheit killed only 6.5 percent of dust mites.
Some machine’s with a “sanitize” setting will typically be able to get the job done, but you may need to increase the temperature of your hot water by adjusting your water heater.
Zurich-based Cytos Biotechnology announced Thursday that it has initiated the second phase of clinical trials for Immunodrug™, a proposed immunotherapeutic treatment for allergies and asthma.
The trial will include difference tests that will evaluate the tolerability and efficacy of the drug on patients who suffer from dust mite and cat allergies. The results are expected to be in by the middle of 2008.
The researchers involved with Immunodrug™ recognize that there is still an unmet medical need for the treatment of allergic diseases, considering the shortfalls of the three existing methods of treatment. The three approaches that are commonly used today are to simply avoid allergens, prescription medications to subdue symptoms and immunotherapy. Allergens are nearly impossible to avoid, medications to cure symptoms do nothing to prevent allergies and immunotherapy often takes 3-5 years to be effective. Hopefully, the researchers at Cytos Biotechnology can provide us with an allergy cure.
The Advanced Allergy Relief Center, in Tampa Bay, Florida, offers a different kind of allergy treatment; it combines traditional Chinese methodology and digital technology to assess symptoms and treat them from where they begin—the immune system. The treatment has been proven to relieve symptoms that result from exposure to grasses and pollens, molds, dust and dust mites, such as sinusitis and hay fever. Allergic asthma may also be improved.
The treatment relieves the sneezing, itching, headaches and fatigue that’s associated with allergies by correcting how the immune system incorrectly responds to substances that otherwise would be harmless. Correcting the immune system involves training the body to accept certain substances.
Unlike other allergy treatments, this Advanced Allergy Relief requires no shots, is drug-free, and claims to be more affordable than the alternatives.
