The Top 5 IV Infusions to Boost Your Immune System This Winter
01/23/2024 2024-03-12 0:56The Top 5 IV Infusions to Boost Your Immune System This Winter
The Top 5 IV Infusions to Boost Your Immune System This Winter
Patient Care Team Medically reviewed on 1/23/24 by Andrea White, BSN, RN
As winter unfolds, many of us seek ways to boost our body’s natural immunity.
While immune-supporting nutrition, sleep, stress management, and other lifestyle factors are essential, IV therapy can be a powerful ally in the fight against winter viruses like cold and flu, RSV, covid, pneumonia, and strep throat.
This blog delves into how IV infusion therapy can help bolster your immune defenses, offering a blend of scientifically-backed insights and practical health tips.
Join us as we explore this innovative holistic approach to staying healthy during cold and flu season.
Your Immune System and Winter: Why This Time of Year Is Extra Demanding On Our Natural Defenses
Your immune system is an intricate defense network that keeps you healthy by combating threats from bacteria, viruses, parasites, toxins and more.
If you live somewhere like Denver where winter means less sunlight hours and more time indoors, your immune system needs all the help it can get during this time of year.
The reduced sunlight means lower levels of Vitamin D, which is a vital component for maintaining a strong immune system. There’s even growing evidence low Vitamin D levels might be a contributing factor in more severe covid cases.
And just when everyone is more likely to be carrying airborne viruses and other contagious illnesses, winter weather drives us more indoors where these are all more likely to be spread — especially if we’re in areas with poor ventilation.
Even with great airflow, touching an infected surface and then touching our eyes can also be enough to make us catch something. Cold viruses can last on surfaces for about 24 hours, so we don’t even have to be around coughing people — we just have to be around surfaces they’ve coughed near.
Signs Your Immune System May Need Additional Support This Winter
When functioning optimally, your immune system might not need much help from IV therapy or other forms of supplementation. But the problem is most of our immune systems aren’t functioning at an optimal level.
Unfortunately, a weakened immune system doesn’t just mean you’re more likely to catch an airborne virus. It also means you’ll probably be sick for longer, and there’s a greater risk your symptoms could escalate.
Here are some indications your natural defenses might need bolstering:
- Frequent infections: Frequent colds, flus, or other infections throughout the year can suggest a weakened immune system.
- Slow healing wounds and long recovery times: If minor cuts or scrapes take significantly longer than usual to heal, or illnesses tend to linger, these could be signs of impaired immune function.
- Digestive issues: Since around 70% of immune function centers in the gut microbiome, chronic issues like frequent diarrhea, constipation, bloating or reflux demonstrate vulnerability likely connected to gut-immune pathways.
- Fatigue and lethargy: Persistent tiredness and lack of energy that isn’t alleviated by adequate sleep and nutrition can signify weakened immune health.
- Chronic or autoimmune conditions: If you have a chronic health condition like diabetes, HIV/AIDS, or an autoimmune disease, your immune system might be compromised and require additional support.
- Certain medications: Some medications, like steroids or immunosuppressants, can suppress the immune system as a side effect. Monitoring for potential infections if you’re on such medications is crucial.
- Lifestyle factors: Poor diet, lack of sleep, excessive stress, drinking alcohol and smoking can all negatively impact your immune function. Addressing these factors is essential for promoting a healthy immune system.
- Age: The immune system naturally weakens with age, making older adults more susceptible to infections and requiring additional support to be optimal in many cases.
The Benefits of IV Therapy: Why It’s Such An Effective Treatment Method
Intravenous (IV) therapy involves injecting fluid mixtures with concentrated vitamins, minerals and antioxidants directly into your bloodstream. This method bypasses the digestive system, a crucial benefit over food and supplements when it comes to bioavailability and many other advantages.
IV therapy provides an efficient way to give your body highly bioavailable doses of the nutrients it needs to help your immune system run optimally.
Here’s some of the key benefits IV therapy has to offer:
- Immediate Effect: Nutrients administered intravenously are available for immediate use by the body.
- Hydration: Staying hydrated is key to good immune function, and IV therapy is the most powerful method of hydration. It’s no accident that hospitals around the world use IV infusions to hydrate you instead of having you drink water.
- No Digestion Required: IV therapy is ideal for individuals with compromised digestive systems where food and oral supplements can’t be adequately absorbed.
- Bioavailability: IV therapy delivers nutrients directly into the bloodstream, which typically means close to 100% bioavailability. Oral supplements can be as low as 20%-50% depending on factors such as their quality as well as your gut health.
- Allows For Higher Doses of Nutrients: Some treatments, like High-Dose Vitamin C therapy, can only be effectively administered through IV. Intravenous vitamin C can reach blood concentrations more than 50 times higher than oral vitamins (Padayatty et al., 2004)**.
Want to learn more about IV therapy? We offer free 15-minute consultations to answer all your questions. Just grab your time here and let’s discuss how IV therapy can help you balance your immune system, reduce inflammation and brain fog, boost energy, and more.
The Best IV Therapy Infusions for Immune Support
Here are our top recommendations for boosting your immune system with IV infusion therapy.
Each of these treatments offers unique benefits for the immune system, ranging from direct antiviral actions to enhancing overall cellular health and immune response.
1. IV Ozone Therapy with UBI (Ultraviolet Blood Irradiation): Supercharging Your Immunity With Oxygenation
Ozone is a colorless gas made up of three oxygen atoms. It’s been used for decades in various medical applications due to its powerful antimicrobial and anti-inflammatory properties.
IV Ozone therapy is a remarkable method for regulating immune function. If we had to recommend just one treatment for immune support, this would be it.
How it works:
During an ozone treatment, a small amount of blood is temporarily removed using an intravenous catheter and mixed with medical-grade ozone before it’s re-infused back into your body.
This helps increase the oxygenation levels of your blood, kills off pathogens like bacteria and viruses, reduces inflammation, and helps stimulate your immune system naturally — without medication or chemicals.
Some clinics such as ours include an extra step, exposing your blood to UV light (ultraviolet blood irradiation) to further inactivate pathogens before your blood’s reintroduced.
Note: Although it is harmful to inhale ozone, ozone blood therapy is incredibly safe and non-toxic.
Key benefits:
Naturally regulates the body’s immune response
Inactivates viruses, bacteria, and fungi
Can help calm and regulate an overactive immune system
Improves circulation and oxygen supply to tissues
2. High-Dose Vitamin C IV Therapy: An Antiviral, Antioxidant Powerhouse
Vitamin C is a crucial micronutrient for immune defense. A powerful antioxidant, vitamin C combats inflammation, stimulates white blood cells, acts against viral infections, and aids tissue healing.
As the name suggests, High-Dose Vitamin C IV therapy involves infusing high doses of vitamin C directly into your bloodstream. Receiving it intravenously allows for up to 100 grams per infusion, concentrating vitamin C in the bloodstream and creating far more potent antiviral and antioxidant activity than oral supplements can provide.
Key benefits:
Potent antioxidant properties, neutralizing free radicals before they can trigger inflammatory processes
Stimulates white blood cell production and boosts their potential to kill pathogens
Aids collagen production and tissue repair
Can reduce the severity and duration of colds if taken regularly before illness
At high concentrations, vitamin C has even shown to be toxic to cancer cells in vitro. It also enhances our immune system’s cancer-fighting abilities, and boosts the effectiveness of immunotherapy drugs.
Note: Look for a clinic that offers Vitamin C infusions free from GMO ingredients and preservatives.
3. Myers’ Cocktail/Immune Booster: Replenishing Our Immune Systems with Key Nutrients
Perhaps the most well-known IV infusion, the Myers’ Cocktail (named after Baltimore physician John A. Myers) combines key vitamins and minerals such as vitamin C, magnesium, calcium, and various B vitamins.
Key benefits:
Improves nutrient deficiencies
Supports overall immune system function
Helps to reduce systemic inflammation
Reduces fatigue and boosts energy
Double The Power: Our Immune-Boosting Double Myers Infusion
At our clinic, we combine two Myers’ Cocktails together into our Immune Booster Infusion, also adding the immune-boosting trio of Zinc, Selenium, and Lysine (detailed below) to provide an even more robust defense against winter illnesses. While immune-supporting infusions vary from clinic to clinic, most offer a version of Myers Cocktail and should be able to customize it with additional nutrients for you.
4. Glutathione: The Master Antioxidant for Immune Defense
Glutathione is an antioxidant produced naturally by the body, but glutathione levels can decline with age and certain health conditions.
Often referred to as the ‘master antioxidant,’ glutathione safeguards cell health, enables cell development, regulates immune cell messengers, and supports energy pathways. This multifaceted antioxidant function translates to more effective immune response.
Key benefits:
Reduces oxidative stress
Supports detoxification processes
Enhances immune cell function
Glutathione is commonly available as a stand-alone injection and as an add-on to other infusions. At our clinic we provide both. The benefit of making it an add-on is that you can receive the additional benefits without an additional needle.
5. Zinc, Selenium, and Lysine: A Powerful Immune-Boosting Trio
Zinc and Selenium are vital for healthy immune function, and Lysine has antiviral properties. Together, they form a powerful trio that bolsters your body’s natural defenses.
Studies have shown that zinc deficiency can reduce the production and activity of white blood cells and other immune cells, making individuals more susceptible to infections, while zinc supplementation has been shown to improve immune function and even reduce the severity and duration of colds and other infections.
Key benefits:
Zinc: Vital for immune cell function and wound healing
Selenium: Supports antioxidant defenses and immune response
Lysine: Has antiviral properties, especially against herpes viruses
At our clinic we add these minerals and amino acids to our Immune Booster infusion. Depending on your infusion clinic, you should be able to add-on these ingredients to most of their infusions if they don’t already include them.
Conclusion
As we navigate through the colder months, maintaining a robust immune system is crucial to staying healthy as well as promoting a swift recovery in the event we do come down with something.
In addition to good nutrition, exercise, stress management, and practicing good sleep hygiene, IV therapy is one of the most powerful tools you can add to your health and wellness plan to foster powerful immune defenses.
Looking to boost your immune system holistically in Denver?
If you’re looking to boost your immune system inside the greater Denver area, our integrative center features a full spectrum of IV therapy and other holistic wellness options, in addition to integrative mental health services.
Visit here to schedule a free no-pressure consultation with us and learn how a personalized IV therapy and wellness plan can help you reach peak immune health and provide other key benefits like greater energy and focus and less brain fog and inflammation. Or call us to book an infusion at (720)222-0550.
