Here to help

Despite increasingly restrictive regulations, health stores are still a great source of safe and effective remedies.

Elderberry, manuka honey (the genuine, laboratory-tested New Zealand brands), propolis, olive leaf extract, vitamin C, zinc, echinacea (including the increasingly popular Irish Botanica product) plantago, beta glucans, garlic, ivy and thyme – all these and other remedies have been doing what antibiotics can’t manage: keeping viral colds and flu at bay and easing troublesome sinuses, sore throats and chest infections.

Feedback from you, our customers, on what works (and what does not!) is really useful as a back-up to the product training which is an on-going process in our shops. Your likes and dislikes, hearing about your favourite remedies, your suggestions for recipes and what natural therapies have worked – all this information is grist to the mill when we choose what to put on our shelves.

Talk to us! Unfortunately customers don’t always ask staff for advice when it is needed.  Unlike supermarkets, IAHS stores major in service and product knowledge. So if in any doubt – for example wondering whether spelt is safe for coeliacs, if there is a cough remedy for a 6 year old, what might help reduce cholesterol,  or whether there is a good acupuncture clinic in town, just ask us!  We are here to serve you to the very best of our ability, and our Customer Care Protocol puts your safety as our top priority.

Ironically, we often offer what may be viewed as negative advice: if you are on blood thinning medication don’t even take linseeds or indeed any herbal remedy; if your constipation has occurred recently out of the blue get it medically checked and don’t buy a colon cleanse produc;, if you want a magic pill for weight loss without considering how to improve your diet…

Conventional medical practitioners, too, can give negative advice, most often when trying to dissuade patients from over-reliance on antibiotics.  This is where health stores come into the picture.  Elsewhere in this edition you will read of safe alternatives to HRT which doctors and their patients are increasingly reluctant to use, including the magnet which a number of menopausal policewomen in the UK found effective when they tried it out.  Surely a no-nonsense group to select for any clinical trial!

Jill Bell, Well & Good, Midleton, Co. Cork