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Trust Marandure
Getting treatment for a disease or ailment can be a challenge in a challenging economy. It is therefore important to go for the best and most effective treatment method to avoid wasting money.
There are many varied ways of therapy but this week we will focus on hydrotherapy.
Hydrotherapy is the use of water for restoring, maintaining and regulating health, according to the University of New Hampshire Health Services website. Treatments include steam baths, saunas and hot and cold compresses among others. Water is used both internally and externally in many different forms and these include steam, liquid or ice. Many people use hydrotherapy in many different ways, and it can be carried out both by a professional and at home.
The benefit that a patient will receive from hydrotherapy depends on how strong a reaction is achieved. This depends on the patient’s vital reserve, which must be carefully considered before vigorous treatments are prescribed, as no two people are alike.
Aesculapius’ disciple Antonius Musa attained fame by curing the emperor Augustus of chronic lung congestion and catarrh by using the cold bath.
As a reward for this, his statue was erected on the temple of Aesculapius. But lack of discrimination in the use of hydrotherapy led to his downfall. Being called upon to treat the emperor’s nephew, a rather effeminate young man, he employed the same cold bath that worked so well for the athletic soldier and emperor, with the result that the youth was so prostrated that he soon died.
Father Kneipp made a similar mistake. In treating the Pope for chronic rheumatism, he advised an ice-cold bath, with the result that on the very first treatment the Pope, then a frail and aged man unaccustomed to such heroic treatment, was in such pain that he cried for hours.
Had the patient been a sturdy young peasant as Kneipp was accustomed to treating, rather than a feeble Italian gentleman, the prescription might have worked.
Several factors influence the degree and speed of a positive reaction to either heat or cold. The most important of these is general vitality of the treatment. Prolonged illness, fatigue, nervous exhaustion, and anaemia may reduce the body’s ability to react properly.
Poor reactions sometimes occur in the very young, due to incompletely developed heat regulation, and in the very aged. In general, the more the temperature of the application differs with the body’s temperature, the better the reaction.
The reaction will also be directly proportional to the size of the area exposed. Sudden applications of short duration and high intensity give a better reaction than graduated or slowly applied applications.
The actual method of application can also influence the degree of reaction. Friction or pressure will enhance a reaction. Hot drinks taken during or after a treatment, as well as general exercise, will increase certain reactions. In some cases a warm application preceding a cold one will enhance its reactive effect. However, the prolonged application of either heat or cold may cause tissue damage and inhabit the natural reaction.
Once the basic concepts of hydrotherapy are understood, they may be used to produce any of the following effects: pain reliever, lowers fever, reduce cramps, increases perspiration, increases urine production, stimulates menstruation, induces sleep, causes bowel evacuation, causes temperature increase quieting and soothing effect to nervous system, exciting action, and increases physical or mental vigour.
Hydropathic Procedures
Following are just a few examples out of many developed by the fathers of hydrotherapy and hydropathic successful applications over the years.
Bath: Alternate hot and cold sitz bath
This frequently used bath may be applied with benefit in nearly any disorder of the lower abdomen or pelvic region, including menstrual disorders, diseases of the uterus, ovaries, or fallopian tubes, prostatitis, constipation, digestive disorders, and others.
Hydropathic institutions have specifically designed sitz baths, often like two water filled armchairs, facing each other.
One is filled with very hot water, the other with ice-cold water. The patient sits with his or her bottom in the hot water and feet in the cold water for three minutes, and then reverses, with the bottom in the ice-cold water and the feet in the hot water for one to two minutes.
The patient alternates back and forth from hot to cold for three immersions in each temperature, and ends with the bottom in the cold.
The patient finishes the bath by drying vigorously with a rough towel and exercising until sweating is produced.
Although these ready-made sitz baths are ideal, they are rarely available to the home patient. Simple home sitz baths may be improvised by using two large plastic tubs or galvanised washtubs. These must be large enough to accommodate the patient’s bottom easily, and hold enough water to cover the person from umbilicus to mid-thigh.
The hot water temperature should be as warm as the body can comfortably bear and the cold must be very cold. In most areas this means that ice needs to be added to cold tap water and allow melting first to lower the water’s temperature.
For maximum benefit these baths must be done daily from one to four times per day, depending on the patient’s condition. The effect of this bath increases the circulation of blood and lymph to the pelvic region, removes internal congestion, and improves tissues vitality and nutrition.
Cold Sitz Bath
The patient sits in a container as described previously, with cold water but no contrasting hot foot bath. The duration should be short- from 30 seconds to 1 minute. This bath is used much less frequently than the alternate hot and cold sitz bath.
This bath may be very useful in enuresis, with the duration of the cold gradually increased three to five minutes.
Friction rubbing with a loofa mit may be administered with the cold sitz, rubbing the hips, back, and thighs vigorously to increase the body’s reaction.
This is a powerful tonic bath and may be continued three to five minutes daily. It is useful in dealing with cases of bed-wetting, impotence, difficult in conception, and uterine malposition.
Hot Sitz Bath
This bath is the same as the cold sitz bath, except for the hot water, and is of longer duration-from three to 10 minutes. It is useful in relieving colic and spasm or pain due to menstrual cramps, low back pain, haemorrhoids, and intestinal disturbances.
Full Immersion Bath
These baths are similar to either hot or cold sitz baths except that the effect is more generalised since the entire body is covered with water.
Cold Foot Bath
The cold full bath may be used as a tonic, but is less profound in effect than the cold plunge. Repeated cold plunges may be used to cause the temperature to rise, creating an artificial fever. In practise, the cold bath is not used frequently for anything other than its tonic effect.
Full Hot Bath
This is a common bath in most households, which is in many ways very unfortunate. A full hot bath should only be taken for short intervals of two to 10 minutes and for definite therapeutic purposes. Very hot full-immersion baths daily create debility, poor circulation, mental lethargy, physical weakness, and depression.
The Japanese furo is also a hot full-immersion bath and if prolonged will cause the same atonics effect. Short periods of heat need to be interspersed with ice cold plunges to be of any use, and should end with a cold application if for general use and not specific therapeutic purposes.
Hot baths may be beneficial if prolonged and taken at the time menstruation is expected in case of suppressed periods, or for dysmenorrhoea as an antispasmodic.
Other forms of colic benefit, as found under the heading of Hot Sitz Bath.
Trust Gumisai Marandure is a Naturopathy Practitioner based in Bulawayo. He can be contacted on cell: 0772 482 382 or email tgmarandure @yahoo. Com
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