Anyone here get sinus infections regularly have one & looking for relief before I can get in to Doc

[theGinsue]

DON'T MESS AROUND WITH A SINUS INFECTION!

Around early/mid-December I noticed my head-cold was getting worse. By Christmas I knew it had transformed into a sinus infection (I won't go into details). I kept putting off going to the doctor as I had too many things I needed to attend to. I woke up on January 3rd and was struggling to breathe so I went to the ER. Turns out that letting the sinus infection fester allowed it to turn into severe pneumonia. I was in rough shape and spend a day and a half in the ER. Now, I'm still on supplemental oxygen and inhalers, get short of breathe very easily, etc. (Apparently I also have underlying COPD)

PLEASE!, definitely go see a doctor and get it treated before you pull a Ginsue and end up in the ER like me.

[Brass]

USMC - I used to get sinus infections every fall, like clockwork for about 20 years. Then, they suddenly stopped for unknown reasons. Here's what I learned during that time that helped me:

1. I used a nasal decongestant spray to open air passages into the sinuses. If you have a bacterial infection, it is likely anaerobic, and suffers a lot of harm from oxygen exposure. If you're going to use Flonase, that's the time to spray it up the nose, otherwise it will never get where it's supposed to be.
2. Amoxicillin, which is a very common antibiotic, was noticeably effective beginning with the second day of treatment. Obviously, in my case, these were all bacterial infections and it took only a few day of Amoxicillin to completely resolve.

This third and final step is something I'll never do again, even though it was very effective in relieving the symptoms of my stuffy nose and sinuses. My doctor gave me a sinus flush bottle and saline packets made by a company called Neil Med. I used it for years, and it reduced my suffering significantly while I waited for the sinuses to clear. However, the last time I used this flush, I felt the resulting pressure push some of the fluid into my ears, immediately resulting in that stuffed ear feeling like after swimming. It took about two to three months for my ears and hearing to return to normal. I"ll never use a nasal flush system again because of that experience. A hot, steamy shower many times per day seems to be almost as effective as the flush bottle in my case, and a lot less likely to push the infection into new territory.

I found Flonase ineffective, but many people swear by it.