I have never heard about that one, it reminds me of a phrase my grandfather used when people talked about flue and cold magic cure, he would say "If you don't take it, it'll take you a whole week to get over the cold, but if you do take it, it's only going to take 7 days..."

The only thing you can do to speed things up is stay and bed, sleep and get a lot of fluids. Sorry,  but from experience, that's the only thing that really works. As fas as making you feel better, I'm big on ginger tea with honey and lemon and soup, but that's just me...