It is probably a cold!
Your symptoms:
A cold is a viral infection that can be triggered by more than 200 types of virus. You’ll know you’ve caught a cold if you begin to suffer from a blocked or a runny nose, sore throat, cough, tiredness or a sudden fit of sneezes.4
If you’re wondering what are the symptoms of the flu and how these differ from those of a cold, the main differences are that you are more likely to have fever or muscle pain with flu than with a cold and colds usually get better quicker.2
Most of us will catch a cold two to three times a year.5 A cold virus can be spread in the air through coughs and sneezes or picked up by touching infected people or surfaces. A person can be contagious from the day before the illness breaks out and can remain infectious for several weeks. Cold symptoms typically reach their worst two to three days after infection.5
Rest and symptom relief are the best ways of treating a cold.5 Otrivin offers a range of options to help make your cold symptoms more bearable.
References:
- Thirion DJG. Assessment of patients with upper respiratory tract symptoms. Available from: www.e-therapeutics.ca/print/new/documents/MA_CHAPTER/en (last accessed March 2020)
- Eccles, R. 2009. Mechanisms of symptoms of common cold and flu. In Common Cold, Eccles & Weber, eds. Basel, Birkhäuser, 2009;23–45
- American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology. Allergic Rhinitis. Available from: https://acaai.org/allergies/types/hay-fever-rhinitis (last accessed March 2020)
- Eccles R, Martenssen K, Chen S. Effects of intranasal xylometazoline, alone or in combination with ipratropium, in patients with common cold. Curr Med Res Opin. 2010;26:889–899
- NICE CKS. Common cold. Available from: https://cks.nice.org.uk/common-cold#!background (last accessed March 2020)
