 Isn't that so annoying constantly having to clear your throat or the significant post nasal drip that it's just running and running and running in the backgrounds? Now, for many people, the constant clearing of the throat is not just something that happens after excessively large meals with indigestion. For lots of people, constant clearing of the throat is something that is chronic, daily, and unremitting. Now, in this video, I'm going to give you an East-West perspective on what causes this chronic mucus and phlegm in the throat. Hey guys, it's Dr. Alex Hain, board licensed acupuncturist and doctor of traditional Chinese medicine and author of the health book, Master of the Day. So, let's get in. Let's talk about reason number one, which is food allergies. Now, when I grew up as a kid, I was that annoying kid in a home room at eight years old, sitting there, reading a book with all the other little kids, constantly just clearing my throat all the time. Now, for me, this was clearly a genetically predisposed form of chronic congestion that I had. And we'll talk about this in one of our little points later. But for many people, this is a genetic predisposition that people have towards excessive phlegm and mucus sputum production. But for others, this is a sign of certain allergies, the three most common being dairy, wheat, and eggs. But what actually is that mucus? I mean, we know that if you eat a big bucket of dairy and sugar, of course, if you have ice cream, it's going to make you have more mucus, right? But for someone who's already sensitive to this, they'll have that even if they aren't even eating dairy. But what is the mucus itself? Take a look at this research paper here. It's called The Importance of Digestive Mucus and Musins for Designing New Functional Food Ingredients. Now, in particular, this research paper right in the abstract here, it talks about what this mucus is comprised of. Now, this mucus in the intestines, mucus in the digestive system, right? Like the stomach, the throat, the sinuses even. It's a substance that covers the intestinal epithelium and acts as a protective barrier against a variety of harmful molecules, microbial infections, and varying lumen environmental conditions. Now, on top of that, the mucus can also change depending on circumstances that are related to your nervous system. So it is a very dynamic substance that in one way acts as a protective barrier. So for some people, this chronic mucus production is effectively like your body trying to deal with an allergen of some kind. So it produces this excessive sputum. Now, reason number two why you have chronic mucus and sputum production is genetic predisposition. Now, within my profession, traditional Chinese medicine, this is the most common one that I see, that certain people have a very specific kind of constitution. Now, this constitution or body type is what we call the spleen-chee deficient constitution. These are typically people exposed or predisposed to conditions like bloating, food allergies, they tend towards loose stools, fatigue, they tend to catch colds easily. But in general, we say that the spleen generates the mucus. And so when there's excessive saliva production, we end up using herbs like attractolodes, baiju, and poria, which is fuling, along with other medicinal herbs like, for example, renzhen, jinseng, and guajir, cinnamon twig or cinnamon bark. And what these herbs do is they help with the chronic mucus and what TCM calls dampness production. So this chronic sputum production for a lot of people is genetic. So while I say genetic, it does not mean it is not reversible. Genetic just means a tendency. So these people need to eat a very certain way to make sure that the digestive system is not reacting in a way that is producing excessive amounts of mucus. But in general, the spleen functional deficiency category is always the kind that has this chronic mucus production. So this is just one of those little tips and tricks that I see in TCM that you will never ever hear from a medical doctor. There are easy formulas that can stop this in its tracks very, very quickly that don't involve you changing your diet. Because to me, it is an organ dysfunction that is causing this from a TCM point of view. Now, this is one of those little tips that we have actually in my free download below this video, which is four rituals that can help you add years to your life with traditional Chinese medicine. So that guide has four healing practices. And those are some of the practices that I teach in my clinic in Los Angeles or virtually with patients all over. So if you want to learn more about both of those, there's links below this video. The third reason you're having constant mucus and sputum production is upper GI issues. This is also something that's very common for a lot of people that have Frank acid reflux. They know they have acid reflux. They know they get indigestion more than a few times a week. And they know that they really have constant upper GI distress. They probably have GERD, gastroesophageal reflux disease. Now, what that means is that there is a functional issue going on in the stomach where the lower esophageal sphincter, this valve that closes off the stomach like this is no longer closing fully. And so you have this gastric soup that is refluxing up through the sphincter and it should not be. So sometimes my patients with reflux will say they do exercise and when they bend over, they can feel it come up. Or when they lay down at night, they feel it come up. So when the body's prone, the liquid is more likely to slide horizontally when the valve is not fully closed. But it's important to remember that that is a functional valve. It is not a structural issue. No matter how many times your MD tells you, that is not the truth. And on top of that, when you're getting this mucus, you're basically feeling your stomach refluxing. So there's actual mucus and saliva and burning coming up that shouldn't ordinarily be there. In the traditional Chinese medicine point of view, reflux involves these Xiaoyang organs, the gallbladder, the triple warmer, spleen, stomach and pancreas. So very commonly the formulas we use in my clinic to treat these are formulas that treat the stomach acid levels, pancreatic enzymes, as well as gallbladder function. These are typically the main organs that we're treating for reflux. And if it's just excessive mucus production that you're having, typically we treat what we call the stomach and spleen. Now the spleen is really like the spleen, pancreas and stomach and some other functions. It's hard to translate these one-to-one. But the spleen is for sure the origin of this mucus and that probably involves the pancreas as well. So again, when we say spleen cheat efficiency, it doesn't necessarily mean the actual spleen organ anatomically produces the mucus, right? It's coming from the digestive system in particular. And conventional medicine probably says the spleen is just used for the immune system, maybe. But from our point of view, when we say something as a functional deficiency, it encompasses multiple organs and multiple organ systems because this is the original functional medicine. The fourth reason you're having chronic sputum and mucus production is because you actually have chronic post-nasal drip. So whereas some of my patients, it is coming up from the digestive system, the stomach producing the success of mucus, for others it is coming down from the sinuses. Now one of the ways you know this is that for people chronically complaining about mucus and phlegm in the throat, they will often feel some degree of digestive changes or upset, right? Excessive fullness when they eat or reflux or a lot of mucus coming up. But for people with sinus issues, sometimes when they talk, they feel like their nose gets clogged or when they sing or when they lay down, they could feel the drainage quite a lot. And that's one of the ways we can know. Now you might be shocked that in traditional Chinese medicine, we say the lung and the spleen pancreas are a shared organ pair, which means that I can give a formula, let's say that is high in ginseng and dried ginger and an herb called tractoloads and fooling poria, these herbs that TCM says drain dampness. It could be dampness in the sinuses, it could be dampness in the GI, it could be dampness lower abdominal bloating dampness. We can use an herb that will treat the chronic clearing of the throat for the stomach, but it will also drain the sinuses a little bit. So because these organs are all functional pairs, we say the lung and the spleen are related in this way. So you can treat both with one formula. Now the fifth reason is that you're basically eating a bad diet in other words, but in particular, dairy and sugar and things that are sweet tend to generate a lot of this mucus production. So most of you have probably had the experience of having an ice cream cone or a big pie, something really sugary and rich and you're clearing your throat for a while or maybe it's associated with reflux. But in TCM, we give the specific advice to avoid foods that are dampness promoting. That means dairy, sugar, even fruits can be too dampness promoting. I mean, for people who are sensitive to this, a glass of orange juice or a glass of fruit juice will have them clearing their throat for 30 minutes. So staying away from these sweet substances that generate too much yin, as we say. The other thing is general overeating is what we say taxes the spleen pancreas because your body has to produce the enzymes in this gastric soup to digest a heavy meal. So for a lot of people who genetically are predisposed to this, they are prone to having weaker digestive systems. And so smaller, more frequent meals will ease the burden on the spleen pancreas and the stomach in this way. Finally, in terms of dietary advice, there's one diet I would recommend that you could try if you don't want to medically treat it. The one diet would be the specific carbohydrate diet. It is primarily focused on good quality meats, sauteed vegetables, not raw vegetables, which can again exacerbate that if you're doing a lot of salads and a lot of oils. Sauteed vegetables and meats will be low in starches, and starches in general can be one of the foods that exacerbate issues with mucus production. So that's an overview of what these actual main causes are. These five encompass, I would say 98% of the people that I see. It is eminently treatable with TCM formulas, but you can make big changes with diet as well. Now I have a really exciting announcement, which is that I'm creating something called the Healing Library. It's a combination of these online programs I'm launching once per season on how to heal with traditional Chinese medicine, because I'm not seeing much like it on the internet at all, and this is what saved my own life. And so the link below this video is for my free newsletter. If you're on that list, you'll get notified when my first course comes out, which is an introduction to healing with TCM, the original science of healing and longevity. Now that course is launching in a couple weeks. So if you want to learn more, add your name to the list right there below. I'd love to see you in it. Again, I have one related video on this on mucus and dampness right up here.