*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 74519 ***
THE
USES OF WATER
—IN—
=Health and Disease.=
A PRACTICAL TREATISE ON THE BATH, ITS HISTORY AND USES.
BY J. H. KELLOGG, M. D.
PUBLISHED AT
THE OFFICE OF THE HEALTH REFORMER,
BATTLE CREEK, MICH.
1876.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1876,
BY J. H. KELLOGG, M. D.,
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.
PREFACE.
Since the announcement of the alleged discovery of Priessnitz, about
fifty years ago, there has been no scarcity of books upon “Hydropathy,”
“Water Cure,” and kindred topics. With rare exceptions, these works have
been, in reality, little better than advertising mediums for some
individual or institution. As might be expected in works prepared for
such purposes, they have contained numerous and flagrant exaggerations
of the effects of water as a remedial agent, often representing it as a
specific for certain maladies and a sure preventive of others. These
extravagant accounts, together with various absurd teachings relating to
methods of application, have rendered just the popular verdict indicated
by the fact that the dingy shelves of nearly every second-hand book
store in New York and Philadelphia, as well as other large cities, are
laden with these musty old volumes which rest beneath the accumulated
dust of years.
The objects of this work may be briefly summarized as follows:—
1. To present a careful and candid account of the nature of water and
its physiological effects.
2. To explain the effects of water when used as a remedy for disease,
and to demonstrate its value as a remedial agent.
3. To show that the employment of water in the treatment of disease has
been practiced by the most eminent physicians of all ages, and is not a
modern discovery.
4. To expose those absurd and erroneous practices which have brought the
use of water as a remedy into disrepute, and have thus deterred
scientific physicians from adopting it.
5. To provide a convenient manual of the various methods of applying
water.
The reader will observe that water is not presented as a panacea. Its
use is not advocated as a specialty. It is only recommended as one of
the many potent agencies which may be successfully employed in the
treatment of the numerous ills to which humanity is subject—a remedy
which has been abused by quacks and tyros and disgraced by fanatics, but
which still urges a just claim to the attention and consideration of all
candid persons.
J. H. K.
BATTLE CREEK, MICH., SEPT., 1876.
[Illustration: [Fleuron]]
CONTENTS.
PAGE.
=PHYSICAL PROPERTIES OF WATER=, 9
Chemical Composition, 9
Physical Properties, 10
Pure Water, 11
Hard Water, 12
Mineral Water, 12
Magnetic Water, 13
=HYGIENIC RELATIONS OF WATER=, 15
Structure of the Skin, 15
The True Skin, 15
The Cuticle, or Epidermis, 16
The Sweat Glands, 17
The Mucous Membranes, 17
Functions of the Skin, 18
Functions of the Mucous Membranes, 20
The Hygienic Value of Water, 21
Thirst, 22
Regulation of Temperature by Evaporation, 24
Depuration, 25
Cleanliness, 25
How to Make the Skin Healthy, 27
Bathing Protects against Colds, 28
Aristocratic Vermin, 29
Prevention of Disease, 31
Modern Neglect of the Bath, 32
Bathing a Natural Instinct, 33
=PHYSIOLOGICAL EFFECTS OF WATER=, 35
Water as a Diluent, 35
Effects of Solvent Properties of Water, 36
Vital Changes Increased by Water, 36
Effects Resulting from the Modification of Temperature, 38
The Cold Bath, 38
Effect of Cold upon the Pulse, 40
Effect of Cold upon Bodily Temperature, 40
Rationale of Effects of the Cold Bath, 41
The Hot Bath, 43
Rationale of Effects of the Hot Bath, 44
The Warm Bath, 46
Sympathetic Effects of Baths, 47
Modes of Administration of the Bath, 48
=HISTORY OF WATER CURE=, 49
The Bath in Egypt, 49
Bathing among the Jews, 50
Persian Baths, 50
The Bath among the Greeks, 50
Roman Baths, 51
Testimony of Arabian Physicians, 53
Modern Bathing Customs, 53
Modern Medical Use of Water, 55
=REMEDIAL PROPERTIES=, 59
Refrigerant Effects of Water, 59
Sedative Effects of Water, 60
Tonic Effects of Water, 60
Anodyne Effects of Water, 60
Antispasmodic Effects of Water, 61
Astringent Effects of Water, 61
Laxative Effects of Water, 61
Emetic Effects of Water, 61
Eliminative Effects of Water, 61
Alterative Effects of Water, 61
Derivative Effects of Water, 62
Testimony of Eminent Physicians, 62–70
=ERRORS IN WATER CURE=, 71
Cold Water Doctors, 71
Heroic Treatment, 72
Crisis, 74
Hydropathic Quacks, 75
Ignorance among Hydropathists, 75
A Popular Error, 76
Absurd Claims, 77
Neglect of Other Remedies, 78
Rational Hydropathy, 78
=APPLICATIONS OF WATER=, 79
Equalization of Circulation, 79
Regulation of Temperature, 80
Removal of Pain, 81
To Excite Activity, 81
Removal of Obstructions, 82
Dilution of the Blood, 82
Influence on the Nervous System, 82
Temperature of Baths, 83
How to Determine the Temperature of a Bath without a
Thermometer, 85
Rules for Bathing, 87–94
General Baths, 94
Swimming, 95
Plunge Bath, 95
Sponge Bath, 96
Rubbing Wet-Sheet, 98
Wet-Sheet Pack, 101
Shower Pack, 105
Dry Sheet Pack, 107
Full Bath, 107
Half Bath, 109
Shallow Bath, 109
Standing Shallow, 110
Affusion, 111
Pail Douche, 111
Cataract Douche, 112
Hose Douche, 113
Shower Bath, 113
Spray Bath, 114
Local Baths, 115
Sitz Bath, 116
Leg Bath, 118
Foot Bath, 118
Half Pack, 119
Chest Pack, 120
Leg Pack, 120
Chest Wrapper, 121
Wet Girdle, 122
Ascending Douche, 123
Drop Bath, 123
Arm Bath, 124
Head Bath, 124
Eye Bath, 125
Ear Bath, 127
Nose Bath, 127
Compresses, 128
Fomentations, 131
Refrigerant Applications, 133
Miscellaneous Baths, 136
Vapor Bath, 136
Russian Bath, 138
Hot-Air Bath, 139
Turkish Bath, 140
Electric Bath, 141
Electro-Vapor Bath, 143
Dry Rubbing-Sheet, 143
Dry Hand-Rubbing, 144
Air Bath, 144
Sun Bath, 145
Sea-Bathing, 146
Medicated Baths, 147
Oil Bath, 147
Novel Baths, 149
Mud Bath, 149
Earth Bath, 149
Enema, 149
Water Emetic, 151
Dry Hot Applications, 151
Water-Drinking, 153
How to Make a Filter, 154
[Illustration: USES OF WATER]
IN HEALTH AND DISEASE.
PHYSICAL PROPERTIES.
Water is one of the most abundant elements in nature. As rivers, lakes,
seas, and oceans, it covers three-fourths of the earth’s surface. It
even enters largely into the formation of the solid rocks. The clearest
and purest air contains it in large quantities as an invisible gas;
while in clouds, fogs, and mists, it appears in the form of minute
drops.
Water also forms a very considerable part of all vegetable productions,
and constitutes about _three-fourths_ of the human body, as well as
other animal tissues. The blood and the brain are each about four-fifths
water, while the fluid secretions and excretions contain more than
nine-tenths of their weight of this limpid fluid.
=Chemical Composition.=—The chemist designates water as hydrogen oxide,
and represents it by the chemical formula, H_{2}O, which signifies that
it is composed of the two gases, hydrogen and oxygen, in the proportion
of two volumes of the former to one of the latter. Both of these gases
are colorless, transparent, tasteless, and odorless. Hydrogen is the
lightest gas known; oxygen is the great supporter of combustion and
animal life and heat. Water is produced by the burning, or oxidation, of
hydrogen, a process attended with very little light, but most intense
heat. The two gases are explosive when mixed.
=Physical Properties.=—Water exists in three states; viz., as a solid,
in the form of ice; as a liquid, its most common form; and as a vapor,
in the form of steam. When in the last condition, the gaseous, it is
invisible. That to which the term steam is very commonly applied, is not
steam, but water in a state of fine division, or mist.
Below 32° F., pure water exists in the form of ice. Between 32° and
212°, it is a liquid. At 212°, it is converted into vapor. Water also
slowly evaporates at all temperatures below 212°, being absorbed and
held in solution by the air.
Water possesses the greatest specific heat of any substance. By specific
heat is meant the actual amount of heat required to elevate its
temperature a given number of degrees. For example, it requires ten
times as much heat to raise a pound of water 1° in temperature as to
elevate a pound of copper 1° in temperature. To raise the temperature of
a pound of lead 1°, requires only one-thirtieth as much heat as to
produce the same effect upon a pound of water. Water absorbs more heat
by elevation of temperature than any other substance. In passing from
the solid to the liquid state, it absorbs a vast amount of heat without
any elevation of temperature. The same thing occurs in the conversion of
water into steam or vapor by evaporation. In the evaporation of one
pound of water, as much heat is absorbed, or rendered latent, as would
suffice to raise nearly a thousand pounds of water one degree in
temperature. This heat is abstracted from surrounding objects; and,
hence, evaporation is one of the most powerful means of producing cold.
The effect is the same, no matter what the temperature at which
evaporation occurs.
Water is not the best conductor of heat, but it conducts much more
readily than air, and readily communicates its heat to bodies with which
it comes in contact, also abstracting heat when of a lower temperature,
when changing from a solid to a liquid state, or from the liquid to the
gaseous condition.
One of the most useful properties of water is its power to dissolve
numerous substances, its solvent properties being nearly universal. To
this property it owes its value as a cleansing agent.
=Pure Water.=—Absolutely pure water is not found in nature. Rain water
is the nearest approach to it; but even this gathers impurities of
various sorts as it falls through the air, and often becomes very
unwholesome by the absorption of foul gases and the collection of dust
in this way. For any use connected with the human body, the purest water
is always preferable to any other. Filtered rain water and distilled
water are the purest forms of water attainable.
=Hard Water.=—Water is said to be hard when it will not produce a good
lather with soap, but forms curds instead. Hardness is due to the
presence of earthy salts in the water; salts of lime—chalk and
gypsum—are the most common. Ten grains per gallon of any of these salts
is sufficient to render water hard and unfit for use, though some waters
furnished to cities for general use contain from 70 to 160 grains per
gallon of solid matter. Hard water is unfit for cleansing purposes
because its mineral ingredients form insoluble compounds with fatty
substances. When mixed with soap, the lime or other mineral takes the
place of the soda or potash in the soap, and forms an insoluble curd,
instead of a lather.
=Mineral Water.=—Water containing in solution salts of iron, magnesia,
or other metallic elements, as well as sulphur, arsenic, iodine, or any
compound of these or other elements which are capable of imparting a
nauseous or saline taste, an unpleasant odor, or medicinal properties,
has been much employed for the cure of all sorts of chronic ailments.
Such waters are totally unfit for general use for drinking or cooking
purposes, and certainly possess no particular advantages as cleansing
agents. Whether they are useful as medicines is a medical question which
we do not purpose to consider here; but one would naturally suppose that
water which is unfit to cleanse the outside of the body could not be of
very great utility as an internal application.
=Magnetic Water.=—Within the last few years, the scientific world has
been startled with the alleged discovery of “magnetic wells” and
“magnetic springs” in various parts of the country. The claim has been
made and stoutly defended by interested parties that the water furnished
from these sources is magnetic in character, and possesses wonderful
healing virtues on that account. The truth in the matter, when viewed in
the light of science, seems to be that the water of these much-lauded
wells is no more magnetic than any other water; the magnetic phenomena
are all explicable by well-known laws of physics, without attaching to
the water any magnetic properties. A close examination shows that the
iron pipe through which the water passes is the only magnetic object.
The supposition that the pipe derives its magnetism from the water is
both unnecessary and illogical. In the first place, any iron pipe or rod
placed vertical in the ground—or, better, placed parallel to the earth’s
axis—will spontaneously become magnetic. The production of magnetism is
greatly favored by the friction of flowing water, and by jarring, as
beating with a hammer. In the second place, the water possesses no
magnetism to impart. In view of these facts, the conclusion is
inevitable that so-called magnetic water has no existence except in the
minds of certain persons whose credulity greatly exceeds their
scientific knowledge.
“Magnetic” wells and springs are ingenious humbugs. Thousands of people
are duped by them. Hundreds are benefited by getting well washed, and by
enjoying recreation and pleasant social surroundings. The curative
effects are attributed to the imaginary magnetism, while other more
tangible agents are the real means of cure.
HYGIENIC RELATIONS OF WATER.
In order to be able to appreciate the value of water as a means of
preserving health, it is necessary to understand something of the
structure and functions of those portions of the body to which it is
directly applied; viz., the skin, externally, and the mucous membrane,
in the interior of the body.
STRUCTURE OF THE SKIN.
The skin is composed of two principal layers; a thin outer layer, called
the epidermis, cuticle, or scarf skin, and a deeper structure, the true
skin, or dermis. We will describe the latter first.
=The True Skin.=—This structure covers the entire surface of the body.
It varies in thickness according to its location, being thickest upon
the soles of the feet, the palms of the hands, the back, and the outer
portions of the thighs. Its basis is a dense network of elastic fibers,
among which are intricately mingled minute blood-vessels, nerve fibers,
and lymphatic or absorbent vessels. These are most numerous near the
upper surface, and are arranged in loops upon little elevations called
papillæ. In the palms of the hands and upon the soles of the feet these
papillæ are disposed in rows with so much regularity as to give to those
parts a minutely furrowed appearance.
The skin also contains little sacs, or follicles, in which the hairs
originate. In its deeper portions are found two kinds of glands;
sebaceous glands for the secretion of sebaceous or fatty matter to
lubricate the skin, and the perspiratory or sweat glands, the latter of
which will receive a more definite description shortly.
=The Cuticle, or Epidermis.=—At the upper portion of the true skin, new
cells are being constantly formed, which become old in a short time and
are pressed outward by the formation beneath them of other new cells.
The old cells become shriveled and flattened as they grow older, and by
a continuation of the process described, numerous layers of cells are
formed upon the surface of the true skin, the lowest of which is
composed of newly formed cells, while the uppermost one is made up of
dessicated cells having more the appearance of horny scales than of
cells. These several layers constitute the epidermis, or outer skin. It
is totally devoid of sensibility, and has no blood-vessels. It is, in
fact, dead, and is useful only as a protection to living parts beneath.
Scattered among the cells of the epidermis are colored cells, which give
to the skin its proper color. In the Caucasian race, these cells are
few; in the negro, they are abundant; while in the albino, they are
wholly absent.
=The Sweat Glands.=—A close examination of the little ridges found upon
the palms of the hands, by the aid of a small magnifying glass, will
reveal what appear to be fine transverse lines crossing the ridges at
short intervals. A still closer inspection shows that the apparent lines
are really minute openings, guarded by delicate valves. These are the
mouths of the perspiratory ducts, which convey to the surface the
product of the sweat glands. The gland itself is merely a coiled tube,
already described as situated deep down in the true skin, and is
surrounded with a network of blood-vessels. The duct is simply a
continuation of the same tube upward through the cuticle to the surface.
It passes out upon the surface of the skin obliquely, thus leaving a
small portion of the cuticle overlapping its orifice, forming a sort of
valve.
The number of these delicate glands is enormous. It has been carefully
estimated to be about 2,300,000 in a single individual. The length of
each is about one-fifteenth of an inch, making their aggregate length
about two and one-half miles.
=The Mucous Membranes.=—All cavities in the body which communicate with
the surface by openings are lined with a membrane which is called
mucous, from the character of its secretion. The mucous membranes are
continuous with the skin at the natural openings of the body, and very
closely resemble it in structure, being formed of several layers, like
the skin, and having a superficial portion made up of layers formed by
the deeper tissues. Mucous membrane forms the lining of the air-passages
and lungs, of the whole alimentary canal, and of the urinal and genital
organs. Its extent in the lungs alone has been estimated by scientists
at 1400 square feet, or more than seventeen times the whole extent of
the skin.
=Functions of the Skin.=—The skin performs a number of very important
offices for the body. Perhaps the most important is that of excretion.
Each of its millions of sweat glands is actively and constantly engaged
in separating from the blood impurities which would destroy life if
retained. These foul products are poured out through a corresponding
number of minute sewers, and deposited upon the surface of the body to
the amount of several ounces each day, or several pounds, if the whole
perspiration be included in the estimate, as is commonly done.
The skin is also an organ of respiration; it absorbs oxygen, and exhales
carbonic acid gas, with other poisonous gases. The amount of respiratory
labor performed by the skin is about one-sixtieth of that done by the
lungs. In some of the lower animals, the whole work of respiration is
performed by the skin. In the common frog, the respiratory action of the
skin and of the lungs is about equal.
Another important office of the cutaneous tissue is absorption. The
absorption of oxygen has been already referred to; but it absorbs
liquids as well as gases, and to a much greater extent. By immersion in
a warm bath for some time, the weight of the body may be very
considerably increased. Dr. Watson, an English physician of note,
reports the case of a boy whose weight increased nine pounds in
twenty-four hours solely by cutaneous absorption of moisture from the
air. This extraordinary action was occasioned by disease. Seamen, when
deprived of fresh water, quench their thirst by wetting their clothing
with sea-water, the aqueous portion of which is absorbed by the skin.
The lymphatic vessels are believed to be the principal agents in
absorption.
Another remarkable function of the skin is the regulation of
temperature. By its density and non-conducting property it prevents the
escape of necessary heat to a considerable degree. But when the amount
of heat generated in the body becomes excessive, either from abnormal
vital activities, or by exposure to external heat, the skin relieves the
suffering tissues by favoring the escape of heat. This desirable end is
attained through the evaporation of the moisture poured out upon the
surface by the perspiratory glands.
It has been estimated that the evaporation of water from the cutaneous
surface and the mucous membrane of the lungs occasions the loss each
minute of sufficient heat to raise a pint of water 100° F. in
temperature. This is certainly a powerful cooling process.
Lastly, we mention as a further function of the skin, and one which is
not the least in importance, its utility as a sensitive surface. It is a
well-established physiological fact that the mind is only a reflection
of impressions received from without, or at least that its character is
largely determined by the nature of the impressions made upon its organs
of sensibility. The skin is the organ of touch, and the various
modifications of tactile sensibility. It is the most extensive organ of
sensibility in the body, and is very closely connected with all the
great nerve centers, so that it is perhaps the most efficient means
through which to affect the general nervous system. Its intimate
sympathy with internal organs is shown in a great number of diseases in
which this organ evidently suffers on account of disability of some
other one.
=Functions of the Mucous Membranes.=—The functions of the mucous
membranes are strictly analogous to those of the skin. Like the latter
organ, a mucous membrane excretes and absorbs. It eliminates foul
matters, and absorbs useful substances in a fluid state.
The importance of the functions of the skin is shown by the fact that a
person quickly dies when its action is interrupted. A coat of varnish or
caoutchouc, applied over the whole skin, will kill a man almost as
quickly as a fatal dose of strychnia. In experiments upon animals,
horses, dogs, and other animals have been killed by obstructing the
action of the skin by some similar means. A little boy was once killed
by covering him with gold leaf to make him represent an angel at a great
celebration.
The offensive odor of the perspiration, and the characteristic smell of
the sweat-soiled underclothing of a tobacco user, are facts which well
attest the value of the cutaneous functions in removing impurities from
the body.
We are now prepared to consider, understandingly,—
=The Hygienic Value of Water.=—If we except pure air, it may safely be
said that no other element in nature sustains so important relations to
the living system as does pure water. An individual will live much
longer on water alone, than if deprived of drink. Water constitutes a
large proportion of all our food, varying, in grains and vegetables,
from fifteen to more than ninety per cent. If the water thus contained
in solid food were wholly removed, an individual would doubtless be
enabled to subsist longer on water only than on solid food so treated.
Though water undergoes no change in the body, and hence takes no part in
the development of force, it is absolutely essential to the performance
of the vital functions, being necessary to enable the various organs to
perform their offices in the maintenance of the vital activities.
The circulatory system is especially dependent upon this element. Water
is the menstruum which floats the blood corpuscles and the varied
nutritive and excrementitious elements which form the blood. By its aid,
the nutrient particles destined to enter into the structure of the body
are conveyed to the most minute and remote fiber of the intricate human
mechanism where repair or growth is demanded. No other element in nature
is so well suited to this exact purpose as water. It is so limpid and
mobile that it can circulate through the most delicate capillaries
without friction, and can even find its way, by osmosis, into parts
inaccessible by openings.
=Thirst.=—Water is continually passing away from the body. The dry air
entering the lungs by respiration absorbs it from the moist surface of
the pulmonary membranes. A large portion is lost by evaporation from the
skin, upon which it is poured out by millions of little sewers, the
perspiratory ducts, for the purpose of washing away impurities from the
system. The kidneys remove a considerable quantity, with poisonous
excrementitious elements in solution. Through still other channels water
is removed, aggregating, in all, the amount of five pints in twenty-four
hours in the average individual. This loss must be made good, in order
to preserve the requisite fluidity of the blood; and nature expresses
the demand for water by thirst.
Some people rarely drink liquid of any kind. Others consume several
pints in a day. The nature of an individual’s occupation will in a
measure determine the amount of drink required. Stokers, glass-blowers,
and others whose vocation necessitates profuse perspiration, require
more water than others. It will be noticed, moreover, that the character
of the diet has much to do with the demand for drink. Those who subsist
mostly upon fruits and grains, and other vegetable productions, avoiding
the use of stimulating and irritating condiments, require little or no
addition to the juices contained in their food. Those who pursue an
opposite course in dietetics, using largely animal food, salt, pepper,
spices, and other condiments, and perhaps taking a little wine or
something stronger for their stomach’s sake, are under the necessity of
taking considerable quantities of fluid in addition to that provided by
their food.
Water is the only substance which will quench thirst. Beverages which
contain other substances are useful as drinks just in proportion to the
amount of water which they contain, and are unwholesome just in
proportion as the added elements are injurious.
=Regulation of Temperature.=—The evaporation of water from the surface
of the human body is one of the most admirable adaptations of means to
ends exhibited in animal life. All of the vital activities in constant
operation in the body occasion the production of heat. Sometimes the
amount of heat is greater than is needed, and so great as would destroy
the vitality of certain tissues if it were not speedily conducted away.
By evaporation of water from the skin, this is accomplished. When
external heat is great, perspiration is more active than when it is
less, and thus the temperature of the body is maintained at about 100°
F. under all circumstances. By this wonderful provision of nature, man
is enabled to exist under the great extremes of heat and cold presented
in the frigid regions at the poles and the torrid climate of the
equator. By the aid of clothing, human beings have survived a continued
temperature of 60° to 100° below zero; and, by the protective influence
of evaporation, an average of 100° above zero has been endured in
tropical climes. For short periods, so great a degree of heat as 350°
F., or even 600° has been borne with impunity in exceptional instances.
In these cases the extreme heat which would otherwise reduce the body to
a cinder in a few moments is rapidly conducted away by evaporation
without occasioning any damage.
=Depuration.=—Every thought, every movement, the most delicate vital
action, occasions the destruction of a portion of the living tissues,
which is thus converted into dead matter, and becomes poisonous. Many
kinds of poisonous substances are produced within the body in this way.
Some of them are very deadly, and must be hurried out of the system with
great rapidity, as _urea_ and _cholesterine_. Here the marvelous utility
of water is again displayed. It dissolves these poisons wherever it
comes in contact with them, and then as it is brought by the current of
the circulation to the proper organs—the kidneys, liver, skin, lungs,
and other emunctories—it is expelled from the body, still holding in
solution the animal poisons which are so rapidly fatal if retained.
=Cleanliness.=—The skin is one of the most important depurating organs
of the whole body. From each of its millions of pores constantly flows a
stream laden with the poisonous products of disintegration. As the water
evaporates, it leaves behind these non-volatile poisons, which are
deposited as a thin film over the whole surface of the skin. As each day
passes, the process continues, and the film thickens. If the skin is
moderately active, three or four days suffice to form a layer which may
be compared to a thin coating of varnish or sizing. The accumulation
continues to increase, unless removed, and soon undergoes further
processes of decomposition. It putrefies, rots, in fact, and develops an
odor characteristic and quite too familiar, though anything but
pleasant, being at once foul, fetid, putrid, pungent, uncleanly, and
unpardonable.
But the offense to the nose is not the extent of the evil. The unclean
accumulation chokes the mouths of the million little sewers which should
be engaged in eliminating these poisons, and thus obstructs their work.
Being retained in contact with the skin, some portions are reabsorbed,
together with the results of advancing decay, thus repoisoning the
system, and necessitating their elimination a second time.
Here water serves a most useful end if properly applied. It is
unexcelled as a detergent, and by frequent application to the skin will
keep it wholly free from the foul matters described. The necessity for
frequent ablutions is well shown by the fact that nearly two pounds of a
poison-laden solution, the perspiration, is daily spread upon the
surface of the body. It is not an uncommon occurrence to meet with
people who have never taken a general bath in their lives. Imagine, if
possible, the condition of a man’s skin, at the age of seventy or eighty
years, which has never once felt the cleansing effects of a thorough
bath!
One of the most serious effects of this accumulation of filth is the
clogging of the perspiratory ducts. Their valve-like orifices become
obstructed very easily, and depuration is then impossible. It is not
wonderful that so many people have torpid skins. The remedy is obvious,
and always available.
=How to Make the Skin Healthy.=—A man who has a perfectly healthy skin
is nearly certain to be healthy in other respects. In no way can the
health of the skin be preserved but by frequent bathing. A daily or
tri-weekly bath, accompanied by friction, will keep the skin clean,
supple, and vigorous. There is no reason why the whole surface of the
body should not be washed as well as the face and hands. The addition of
a little soap is necessary to remove the oily secretion deposited upon
the skin.
A lady of fashion, in enumerating the means for preserving beauty, says:
“Cleanliness, my last recipe (and which is applicable to all ages), is
of most powerful efficacy. It maintains the limbs in their pliancy, the
skin in its softness, the complexion in its luster, the eyes in their
brightness, the teeth in their purity, and the constitution in its
fairest vigor. To promote cleanliness, I can recommend nothing
preferable to bathing. The frequent use of tepid baths is not more
grateful to the sense than it is salutary to the health and to
beauty.... By such means, the women of the East render their skins
softer than that of the tenderest babe in this climate.” “I strongly
recommend to every lady to make a bath as indispensable an article in
her house as a looking-glass.”
When the foul matters which ought to be eliminated by the skin and
quickly removed from the body are allowed to remain unremoved, the skin
becomes clogged and inactive, soon loses its natural luster and color,
becoming dead, dark, and unattractive. When bathing is so much
neglected, it is no marvel that paints, powders, lotions, and cosmetics
of all sorts, are in such great demand. A daily bath, at the proper
temperature, is the most agreeable and efficient of all cosmetics.
=Bathing Protects against Colds.=—It is an erroneous notion that bathing
renders a person more liable to “take cold, by opening the pores.” Colds
are produced by disturbance of the circulation, and not by opening or
closing the pores of the skin. Frequent bathing increases the activity
of the circulation in the skin, so that a person is far less subject to
chilliness and to taking cold. An individual who takes a daily bath has
almost perfect immunity from colds, and is little susceptible to changes
of temperature. Colds are sometimes taken after bathing, but this
results from some neglect of the proper precautions necessary to prevent
such an occurrence, which are carefully stated elsewhere in this work.
=Aristocratic Vermin.=—Doubtless, not a few of those very refined and
fastidious people who spend many hours in the application of all sorts
of lotions and other compounds to the face and hands, for the purpose of
beautifying those portions of the skin exposed to view—while neglecting
as persistently those parts of the skin protected from observation—would
be very much surprised to learn the true condition of the unwashed
portions of their cutaneous covering. They instinctively shrink with
disgust from the sight of a vermin-covered beggar, in whose cuticle
burrows the _acarus scabiei_ (itch-mite), while troops of larger insects
are racing through his tangled locks and nibbling at his scaly scalp. It
is quite possible that many a fair “unwashed” would faint with fright if
apprized of the fact that her own precious covering is the home of whole
herds of horrid looking parasites which so nearly resemble the itch-mite
as to be at least very near relatives, perhaps half-brothers or cousins.
The name of this inhabitant of skins unwashed is as formidable as the
aspect of the creature, though it does not require a microscope to
display its proportions, as does the latter; scientists call it _demodex
folliculorum_.
The _demodex_ makes himself at home in the sebaceous follicles, where he
dwells with his family. Here the female lays her eggs and rears her
numerous progeny, undisturbed by the frictions of any flesh-brush, and
only suffering a very transient deluge at very long intervals, if such a
casualty ever happens. In studying the structure of these little
parasites, we have found several tenants occupying a single follicle,
pursuing their domestic operations quite unmolested by any external
disturbance.
The _demodex_ has been transplanted from the human subject to the dog;
and it is found that the new colony thrives very remarkably, and soon
produces a disease apparently identical with that known as “mange.”
We have not space to describe in detail these savage little brutes, with
their eight legs, armed with sharp claws, bristling heads, sharp lancets
for puncturing and burrowing into the skin, and their powerful suckers
for drawing the blood of their victims. We only care to impress upon the
mind of the reader the fact that neglect of bathing and friction of the
skin is sure to encourage the presence of millions of these parasites,
and that the only remedy is scrupulous cleanliness of the whole person.
Like their relatives, the itch-mite, they do not thrive under
hydropathic treatment, and are very averse to soap and water. The best
way to get rid of them is to drown them out. They do not produce the
irritation which characterizes the presence of the itch insect, so that
this evidence of their presence is wanting. But they are sure to be
present in a torpid, unhealthy, unwashed skin, no matter how delicate or
fastidious its possessor.
=Prevention of Disease.=—Neglecting to keep the skin active and vigorous
by frequent ablutions is one of the most prolific causes of nearly all
varieties of skin diseases, which are too often aggravated by gross
dietetic habits. The relation between the cutaneous function and that of
the kidneys is so intimate that neglect of the kind mentioned, resulting
as it must in obstruction of function, is a very common cause of most
dangerous disorders of the renal organs. Inactivity of the skin is also
very commonly associated with dyspepsia, with rheumatism, gout,
hysteria, and other nervous derangements. It is also a not uncommon
cause of bronchial and pulmonary affections. It is quite evident, then,
that the proper and most efficient means of preventing these diseases is
to maintain the functional vigor of the skin by the proper application
of water.
The value of water as a prophylactic, or preventive, of disease, was
recognized by the ancients, and the bath was employed by them to an
extent which has never been equaled in modern times. The great Hebrew
lawgiver, Moses, enjoined upon his followers the most scrupulous
cleanliness, making bathing a part of their religious duties. His
example was followed by the ingenious founder of Mohammedanism, who
required his disciples to bathe before each of their five daily prayers.
Among the Greeks, and especially the temperate Spartans, the bath was
regarded as one of the most essential means of securing physical health.
Daily ablutions were practiced by them, every person participating in
the bath, from the newborn babe to the oldest inhabitant. The Romans
cultivated bathing to a remarkable extent, making it a luxury rather
than the dreaded penance which many moderns seem to regard it.
=Modern Neglect of the Bath.=—The most celebrated physicians, from
Hippocrates down to Galen, Celsus, Boerhaave, and a host of more modern
physicians, have agreed in eulogizing the bath as an invaluable means
for preserving the health. Notwithstanding this fact, it seems that as
civilization and enlightenment have advanced, the importance of the bath
has been increasingly disregarded. The magnificent public baths of the
Romans were neglected as that empire declined, until they were finally
destroyed. Michelet, a historian of some note, tells us that for a
thousand years during the Dark Ages the bath was unknown in Europe. This
fact alone is in his opinion sufficient to account for the terrible
plagues and pestilences of that period. A modern writer declares that in
Spain the religious instincts of the people have become so perverted
that it is considered sacrilege for a woman to bathe more than once in
her life, which is upon the eve of her marriage. In more enlightened
countries, it is to be hoped that the condition of the feminine cuticle
is not quite so bad as this; but another writer, an Englishman, asserts
that a large proportion of his countrymen “never submitted themselves to
an entire personal ablution in their lives, and many an octogenarian has
sunk into his grave with the accumulated dirt of eighty years upon his
skin.” American customs in this respect are not much better than the
English; but it is gratifying to know that a very perceptible
improvement is becoming evident in both countries. Our intercourse with
Oriental nations and barbarians has taught us wholesome lessons in the
care of the person. There is scarcely a savage tribe to be found in the
deepest jungles of tropical Africa the members of which do not pay more
attention to the preservation of a clean and healthy skin than the
average American or Englishman.
=Bathing a Natural Instinct.=—All nature attests the importance of the
bath. The rain is a natural shower bath in which all vegetation
participates, and gains refreshment. Its invigorating influence is seen
in the brighter appearance, more erect bearing, and fresher colors, of
all plants after a gentle rain. The flowers manifest their gratitude by
exhaling in greater abundance their fragrant odors. Dumb animals do not
neglect their morning bath. Who has not seen the robin skimming along
the surface of the lake or stream, dipping its wings in the cool waters,
and laving its plumage with the crystal drops which its flapping pinions
send glittering into the air? No school boy who has ever seen the
elephant drink will forget how the huge beast improved the opportunity
to treat himself to a shower bath, and perhaps the spectators as well,
for he is very generous in his use of water.
If man’s instincts were not rendered obtuse by the perverted habits of
civilization, he would value the bath as highly and employ it as freely
as his more humble fellow-creatures, whose instinctive impulses have
remained more true to nature, because they have not possessed that
degree of intelligence which would make it possible for them to become
so grossly perverted as have the members of the human race. Man goes
astray from nature not because he is deficient in instinct, but because
he stifles the promptings of his better nature for the purpose of
gratifying his propensities.
PHYSIOLOGICAL EFFECTS.
Some of the relations of water to the living system have been considered
in the preceding section. In the present connection we shall consider
chiefly those effects resulting from the application of water to the
human body in various ways which give to it its value as a remedial
agent, though its therapeutical applications will be deferred to
succeeding sections.
The effects of water upon the human system are the results of the
operation of its physical properties in conjunction with the vital
forces. As with all other agents, its effects may be either local, or
general, according to the mode of application. Different effects are
also produced according as the administration is internal or external.
Many other modifying circumstances, as age, sex, and physical condition,
affect the results in a greater or lesser degree.
Water affects the system through three different means; viz.:—
1. As a diluent;
2. By its solvent properties;
3. By modifying the general or local temperature of the body.
=1. Water as a Diluent.=—Water is received into the system by
absorption, either through a mucous membrane, or through the skin. It
usually enters through the medium of the stomach and intestinal canal.
When received into the blood, it of course increases its volume, and
produces an increased fullness of the circulatory vessels, which are
never distended to their fullest extent, and hence allow room for change
in the volume of their contents. The blood is necessarily rendered more
fluid, and if previously in any degree viscid, its circulation is
quickened by its dilution.
=2. The Effects of the Solvent Properties of Water.=—With the exception
of air, water is the most transient of all the elements received into
the body. It is eliminated by the skin, the lungs, the kidneys, and the
intestines. By its solvent action, it dissolves the various poisonous
products of the disintegration of the tissues. The volume of the blood
being increased, more water comes in contact with the debris contained
in any part, and, in consequence, the same undesirable products are more
perfectly removed. The increased amount of excrementitious matter in
solution is brought in contact with the various depurating organs,
producing, notably, the following results:—
a. _An increase of the urinary excretion._ It is an important fact that
this increase does not consist in the addition of water merely, or
dilution, but that there is also an increased amount of _urea_, the
chief excrementitious principle removed from the blood by the kidneys.
b. _An increase in the cutaneous excretion._ Water-drinking is one of
the most efficient means of producing copious perspiration, which, as
with the urinary excretion, is not a mere elimination of water, but is a
real depurating process.
c. _Increased action of the intestinal mucous membrane._ Elimination
from the mucous membrane of the intestinal track, which is an important
organ of excretion, is also increased by drinking freely of pure water.
The result of this increased action is not only to remove from the blood
some of its foulest constituents, but to render more fluid the contents
of the intestines, and thus tend to obviate that almost universal
accompaniment of sedentary habits, constipation.
The removal of clogging matters from the system in this manner allows
greater freedom of vital action, so that the activities of the body are
quickened, and both waste and repair, disintegration and assimilation,
are accelerated.
The use of water thus hastens all the vital processes by increasing the
change of tissue. This result is of course chiefly obtained by employing
it as a drink. The experiments of Liebig fully confirm this view. He
expressly mentions the free use of water as one of the means of
accelerating vital change. Prof. John B. Biddle, M. D., in his “Materia
Medica,” states that “it promotes both the metamorphosis and
construction of tissue,” from which fact he attributes to it valuable
curative properties, as an alterative, when the removal of a morbid
taint is desired, as in certain venereal diseases.
=3. Effects resulting from the Modification of Temperature.=—Perhaps the
most important, certainly the most common, effects of water upon the
living organism are those which result from its modifications of the
temperature of the body in its various modes of application. These
effects vary greatly according to the temperature, and the duration of
the application. General and local applications also differ in their
results.
It should be remarked that all of the effects of water are really the
results of the vital resistance of the system in its attempts to remove
abnormal or unusual conditions, or to accommodate itself to new
circumstances.
Baths are divided into six classes, according to their temperature, as
follows:—
1. Cold, 33° to 60° F.
2. Cool, 60° „ 70°
3. Temperate, 70° „ 85°
4. Tepid, 85° „ 92°
5. Warm, 92° „ 98°
6. Hot, 98° „ 112°
For the sake of simplicity, we will consider the effects of water
applications under three heads; viz., cold, warm, and hot.
_The Cold Bath._—Under this head we will consider applications of all
temperatures below 85° F. Cold or cool water, applied to any portion of
the body, causes instant contraction of the small arteries of the part,
through its influence upon the sympathetic or vasomotor system of
nerves. So long as the application of the unusual temperature is
continued, the vascular contraction is maintained, and the part seems
nearly bloodless. If the cold is below 33° F., and is long continued,
destruction of the tissues, by freezing, will result.
If a moderately cool or cold temperature is maintained for some time,
the blood-vessels of the part are more or less permanently contracted,
and the blood supply thus lessened. If, on the other hand, the
application is very brief, the contraction of the vessels is only
momentary, and is followed by a proportionate degree of relaxation, and
a corresponding increase in the supply of blood to the part.
A very cold bath applied to any considerable portion of the body, and
continued more than a very brief time, produces headache, dullness,
sometimes nausea and vomiting, loss of sensibility, and other unpleasant
and painful symptoms.
It is thus seen that the effects of cold are quite different—exactly
opposite, in fact—as the application is a prolonged, or a brief one. The
long application produces effects in some degree permanently sedative,
while the brief application is followed by a momentary condition which
may be termed shock, and which is usually followed very quickly by a
reaction analogous to stimulation when produced in any other manner.
_Effect of Cold upon the Pulse._—The experiments of Drs. Currie, Bell,
and others, show conclusively that the cold bath has the uniform effect
of diminishing the frequency of the heart’s action from ten to twenty
beats in a minute below the usual standard. Upon the first application
of cold, there is a slight increase in the rate of pulsation; but this
soon subsides, and is succeeded by a marked diminution. The ultimate
effect is the same, whether the application is made at its maximum
degree of severity or not; but if the application is first warm, being
gradually reduced in temperature, the result is reached without the
occurrence of the unpleasant shock, or feeling of chilliness, which
attends the sudden application of cold, especially in persons of
delicate nervous sensibilities. The amount and after duration of the
diminished rate of pulsation depends upon the temperature and duration
of the bath. In health, it does not commonly extend beyond a few hours
at most.
_Effect of Cold upon Temperature._—It was also shown by the same
experimenters that the temperature of the body is reduced
proportionately with the action of the heart. The natural temperature,
as shown by a thermometer placed in the axilla, is 98° F. During and
after a cold bath, the thermometer applied to the same part, indicates
from one-half a degree to five or six, or even more, degrees, diminution
of temperature. In some cases the temperature continues to fall after
the bath. The real temperature is lessened even though the skin may
glow, and may seem to possess increased warmth. Cold and heat are,
within certain limits, wholly relative terms to the nerves of
sensibility. What is warm at one time may be cold at another, though the
temperature remains the same. The same temperature may be warm to one
hand and cool to the other. Temperature can only be _accurately_
determined by the thermometer.
_Rationale of Effects of the Cold Bath._—The manner in which the cold
bath produces the sedative effects noted, is apparently simple. When
applied locally, to a single organ or part, it diminishes the
circulation in the part by occasioning contraction of the muscular coats
of the _arterioles_, or small arteries. Their caliber being thus
lessened, they of course allow the passage of less blood, and the
circulation in the part is diminished. There are, then, three causes for
the decrease of heat; viz.,—
1. A portion of the heat of any part is brought to it by the blood; the
supply of blood being lessened, the heat is diminished;
2. Heat is produced by vital or chemical changes which occur in the
capillaries or their immediate vicinity. These depend chiefly upon the
supply of oxygen, which, again, is largely regulated by the blood
supply; and it being lessened with the blood, the amount of heat
_produced_ is diminished.
3. The water in contact with the part, being of a lower temperature,
abstracts heat from it as it would from any other body of a higher
temperature than itself.
When the application of cold water is more general, being made to the
whole body, or to a considerable portion of it, the same effects are
produced on a larger scale. A large proportion of the small arteries of
the body, being brought under the influence of cold, are made to
contract, thus directly lessening the circulation, and so diminishing,
also, the production of heat. Through the sympathetic system, the same
effect produced upon the small arteries is produced also upon the heart,
lessening the rapidity of its contractions. Again, it has been
satisfactorily shown that the action of the heart is largely controlled
by the action of the small arteries; so that we have abundant
explanation of the decrease in the rate of pulsation. Finally, we have a
cold fluid in contact with a large portion of the body, abstracting heat
by conduction, as well as lessening its production.
Thus we see that water, when applied at a proper temperature, is one of
the most powerful means of depressing the vital activities of the body,
diminishing circulation and animal heat as will no other agent. The
several modes for applying it are considered in another portion of this
work.
_The Hot Bath._—We shall include under this head applications of a
temperature above 98° F., the mean temperature of the body. As with the
cold bath, the effects differ greatly according as the application is
brief or prolonged. Local and general applications also differ in their
effects.
A brief local application causes an increase in the circulation of a
part which very closely resembles, perhaps is identical with, active
congestion. The small arteries are distended, and the vital activities
and heat of the part are increased. The several effects seem to be
little different from those resulting from the application of a mild
sinapism. The action of the vital instincts is defensive in both cases.
When applied to special organs, special effects are produced. For
instance, a hot fomentation applied to the head for a few minutes will
usually produce drowsiness by diversion of a portion of the blood supply
of the brain to the skull and scalp. Prolonged applications produce a
more or less permanent relaxation of the blood-vessels, and consequent
congestion.
A hot bath applied to the whole body, or a large portion of it, produces
an acceleration of the pulse and an increase of animal heat
proportionate to the temperature of the bath. A bath at 106° to 108° F.
will increase the pulse from the normal standard to one hundred or one
hundred and twenty beats in a minute, in a short time. A bath four or
five degrees hotter has been known to increase the pulse to more than
one hundred and fifty beats in a minute.
When a hot bath is prolonged, the face becomes flushed, and the whole
skin very red; the head aches; sight is sometimes dimmed; ringing in the
ears, faintness, a stinging pain in the skin, and intense desire to
urinate are symptoms which are often present. Copious perspiration and
intense congestion of the skin are constant effects. The cutaneous
congestion, from relaxation of the blood-vessels, is apt to continue to
exist after the bath, if it is greatly prolonged, to the serious injury
of the subject.
The effects of the vapor bath are essentially the same as those
described, though a somewhat higher degree of heat is tolerated without
injury. In the hot-air bath, a still higher heat is borne with impunity.
_Rationale of Effects of the Hot Bath._—It scarcely need be repeated
that all of the effects noticed, as well as those of all other baths,
are chiefly the results of modifications of vital action occasioned by
the agent employed. The application of heat to the body occasions
relaxation of the muscular coats of the small arteries, and increased
action of those vessels. No doubt this is for the purpose of bringing
moisture to the surface to protect the tissues against the unnatural
heat. As is the case with cold baths, the causes which modify the heat
are three; viz.,—
1. The increased quantity of blood circulating through the part brings
to it an increased amount of heat;
2. Increased vital and chemical action increases the production of heat;
3. The body absorbs heat from the surrounding medium as any other colder
object would do.
In the general application of hot water or vapor, effects similar to its
local effects are produced upon the whole surface of the body,
involving, also, to a considerable extent, the deeper structures. The
pulse is accelerated because the small arteries are distended and more
active, creating a demand for a greater quantity of blood, requiring an
increase in the heart’s action. It is also quite probable that the
action of the heart is somewhat quickened as the result of the influence
of heat upon the pneumogastric nerve which controls it.
The cerebral symptoms, faintness, etc., which occur when heat is applied
in excess, are the result of the diversion of so large a proportion of
the blood into the superficial vessels. A prolonged hot foot bath or leg
bath will often produce faintness.
There are few agents which will so rapidly produce such powerfully
excitant and stimulant effects as the hot bath. The painful and
undesirable results occasioned by its incautious use are evidences of
its power.
_The Warm Bath._—In this connection we apply the term warm to baths of a
temperature between 85° and 98° F., though baths of a temperature
between 85° and 92° would be more accurately termed tepid, which term is
applied to baths of that temperature elsewhere than in this immediate
connection.
The warm bath never exceeds the temperature of the body, and is usually
below it. Its effect is uniformly to diminish the frequency of the pulse
and of respiration, and to decrease animal heat. Its effects are the
same as those of the cool or cold bath, in this respect, but they differ
in several other particulars. Unlike the cold bath, the warm bath is not
accompanied by an unpleasant shock, or chill, and, hence, is not
followed by reaction. It promotes the action of the skin in a very
marked degree, increasing both perspiration and absorption. When
continued for an hour or two, the weight is appreciably increased by the
absorption of water. Its general effects are very mild and soothing,
often inclining the patient to sleep.
This bath seems to produce its effects not so much by exciting the vital
energies to abnormal action or resistance, as by supplying the most
favorable conditions for the performance of the natural and usual
functions. This is doubtless on account of its close approximation to
the temperature of the body. In this respect, if this supposition be
true, it differs from baths of a temperature either much above or
greatly below the normal temperature of the body.
The warm vapor bath produces effects quite analogous to those of the
warm water bath. Its effect upon the processes of perspiration and
absorption is a little more marked, even with the same degree of
temperature. The results differ somewhat, according as the whole body is
enveloped, so that the warm vapor is taken into the lungs, or the head
excluded. A more equable effect is produced by including the whole body
in the bath, and no harm can result if the temperature is not raised
above that of the body, as it should not be, in the _warm_ bath.
=Sympathetic Effects.=—There is scarcely room for doubt that many of the
effects of the various kinds of water applications are wholly of a
sympathetic character. All portions of the body are intimately
associated together by a system of nerves called the sympathetic system,
from their peculiar function. Certain portions, as the skin and mucous
membrane, are particularly related. The large number of sensitive nerves
which connect the skin with the brain, bring it in peculiarly close
relations to that organ, and give additional potency to any agent
applied to so extensive a surface. The well-known fact that burns of the
skin are often the occasion of fatal ulceration of the mucous membrane
of the intestines sufficiently attests the intimate relation between
these two tissues; while the effects upon the skin of mental emotions,
as of shame and of fear, are conclusive evidence of the peculiar
closeness of relation between the cerebral and cutaneous organs. The
condition of the mind has much to do with the effect of a bath.
=Modes of Administration.=—There are numerous modes of administering
baths of all temperatures, each of which produces some modification of
the general effect of the given temperature. For example, such baths as
the douche, the spray, and the shower bath, are much more cooling in
their effects than a full bath at the same temperature; since, in the
latter case, nearly the whole body would be submerged in a medium of
equable temperature, while in the case of the spray, etc., the body
would be additionally cooled by the rapid evaporation taking place upon
its surface. Many other peculiar effects are obtained by particular
modes of administration, which will be described in their proper place.
HISTORY OF WATER CURE.
The utility of water as an agent in the treatment of disease is not a
modern discovery, as the pretensions of some aspirants for notoriety
have led many to believe. A very cursory glance at the history of
various ancient nations furnishes sufficient evidence that the use of
the bath as a curative agent was of very remote origin. The works of the
oldest medical authors contain numerous references to the bath,
recommendations of its use in cases of disease, and testimonials of its
good effects when properly employed. As this is a matter of some
interest to many of those who employ and advocate the use of water as a
remedial agent, as well as to those who are investigating its merits, we
shall devote a little space to a sketch of the use and estimation of the
bath by various nations and tribes—civilized and barbarous—and regular
and irregular physicians, from the remote ages of antiquity down to
modern times. For several of the facts presented we are indebted to a
valuable work by Dr. Bell, long out of print and now somewhat rare.
=The Bath in Egypt.=—That bathing was practiced to a considerable extent
by the Egyptians at a very early period, is evinced by both sacred and
profane history. It was through obedience to this custom that Moses was
discovered among the rushes by Pharaoh’s daughter as she went down to
the river side to bathe. Pictures discovered in ancient Egyptian tombs
represent persons preparing for the bath. We have no expression of the
estimate which was placed upon the bath as a remedial agent; but it is
hardly possible to believe that an agent held in such high esteem as a
preventive of disease should not be valued as a useful remedy.
=Bathing among the Jews.=—The code of laws prepared by Moses, under
divine instruction, for the government of the Hebrew nation after its
departure from Egypt, made bathing a prominent feature. The connection
of the bath with the treatment of leprosy would naturally lead to the
conclusion that it was employed for its curative effects.
=Persian Baths.=—The ancient Persians held the bath in such high esteem
that they erected magnificent public structures devoted to bathing. The
baths of Darius are spoken of as especially remarkable.
=The Bath among the Greeks.=—The cold bath was employed among the
Greeks. Lycurgus, the famous Spartan legislator, prescribed its daily
use for all his subjects, not excepting the tendered infants. In later
times, the warm bath was introduced, and stately buildings were erected
for the accommodation of bathers.
The learned Greek, Hippocrates, the father of medical literature, and a
very acute observer of disease and the effects of various agents upon
the body, highly recommended the use of water in many diseases,
describing with great care the proper mode of administering a simple
bath. He laid great stress upon the careful and skillful use of the
bath, asserting that, when improperly applied, it, “instead of doing
good, may rather prove injurious.” His directions for the employment of
the bath were very discreet. He very wisely remarks that those patients
whose symptoms are such as would be benefited by bathing should be
bathed, even though some of the requisite conveniences may be wanting;
while those whose symptoms do not indicate the need of this remedy,
should not employ it, though all the necessary appliances are at hand.
He made great use of water as a beverage in treating disease.
=Roman Baths.=—The Romans excelled all other nations in the
sumptuousness of their bathing arrangements. Their public baths were
among their greatest works of architecture, and were supplied with every
convenience for increasing the utility and luxury of the bath. Kings and
emperors vied with each other in perfecting and enlarging these sanitary
institutions. Accommodations were provided, in some cases, for nearly
20,000 bathers employing the baths simultaneously; and at one time the
number of public baths in Rome was nearly one thousand. Even Nero, whose
name has come down to us covered with infamy, has the credit of doing at
least one good act in erecting a magnificent public bath, though even
the detergent effects of such an act can hardly cleanse his character of
the many foul blots by which it is rendered odious.
Celsus and Galen, two noted Latin physicians, extolled the bath as an
invaluable remedy, almost two thousand years ago. The latter pronounced
the bath to be one of the essential features of a system of perfect cure
which he termed _apotheraphia_, exercise and friction being the other
essentials. If the regular physicians of half a century ago had followed
the practice of Galen, as described in his works, they would have
refreshed their languishing fever patients with cold water as a beverage
instead of leaving them to be consumed by the pent-up fires which
parched their lips, disorganized their blood, and finally ended their
sufferings with their lives. Celsus was proud to boast of employing the
bath more frequently and systematically than others had done before his
time.
The Emperor Augustus was cured, by the bath, of a disease which had
baffled all other remedies.
=Testimony of Arabian Physicians.= — Although the Arabians are at the
present day looked upon, and justly, as a horde of wandering wild-men, a
thousand years ago their physicians were among the most learned of the
age; and they were as sensible as learned, we judge, for they were most
enthusiastic advocates of the efficiency of the bath. Rhazes, one of the
most eminent of them, describes a plan of treating small-pox and measles
which would scarcely be modified by the most zealous advocate of water
treatment at the present day. Avicenna and Meshnes, with others, may be
mentioned as holding similar views.
The bath was much used in pestilences by this nation, and was largely
employed in Constantinople in the fifteenth century.
=Modern Bathing Customs.=—Three centuries ago, public vapor baths were
very numerous in Paris, being connected with barber shops, as are many
baths in this country at the present time. According to Dr. Bell, Paris
can still boast of a great number of bathing establishments. He states
that in the baths connected with the city hospitals nearly 130,000
thousand baths were administered in a single year to out-door patients.
Doubtless those treated in the hospitals were duly washed and steamed as
well. This is certainly a very marked contrast with what we see in the
hospitals in this country at the present day. Notwithstanding the
advances in many other particulars of hospital management, the cuticles
of patients are sadly neglected. In some of our largest hospitals, the
filthiness of many patients is so great that close proximity to them is
absolutely intolerable. Half a dozen of them, placed in a warm room,
speedily impart to the air a fetor unequaled by anything but the
effluvia arising from a neglected pig-sty. Such neglect is inexcusable.
The Germans of olden time were very fond of bathing, according to their
historical records, and during the Middle Ages, when plagued by the
leprosy, the national faith in the virtues of the bath was manifested by
making it a religious duty. It is related of Charlemagne that he used to
hold his court in a huge warm bath. Modern Teutons seem less partial to
the bath, having transferred their fondness from _aqua pura_ to lager
beer.
Although the bath was very freely used in England while the island was
occupied by the Romans, who erected commodious baths like those in Rome,
the wholesome practice is now sadly neglected by the English people, if
we may credit their own writers.
It is a curious fact that the bath seems to be quite generally neglected
by the most civilized races, while it is almost universally employed by
those less advanced nations, the Russians, Turks, Finlanders, and the
inhabitants of Persia, Egypt, Barbary, and Hindostan. The Finlanders
make great use of the sweating bath. To nearly every house is attached a
small sweat-house, where they subject themselves to a temperature of
more than 160° F., often emerging at once into an atmosphere much below
freezing, with apparent impunity. The Turkish and Russian baths, similar
to which are those in use in Egypt and India, are elsewhere described.
The North American Indians employ the bath for many diseases. They have
original and peculiar ways of administering both water and vapor baths.
The most common bath among them is the vapor, followed by a plunge into
a neighboring stream. They generate the steam by pouring water upon hot
stones while they are inclosed in a small, close hut made of mud or
skins. The native Mexicans secure a hot-air bath by confining themselves
in a brick sweat-house which is heated by a furnace outside. These
savages seem to have the most implicit confidence in the efficacy of the
bath, always employing it when ill, and with excellent success.
=Modern Medical Use of Water.=—In the early part of the eighteenth
century, a Sicilian named Fra Bernado acquired the title of “coldwater
doctor” from his exclusive use of cold water in treating the sick.
At the very beginning of the eighteenth century, Floyer published a
history of bathing which contains accounts of many remarkable cures
effected by means of the bath, which he recommended as a most efficient
cure for numerous diseases.
A Mr. Hancock, a clergyman, published, in 1722, a tract entitled,
“Common Water the Best Cure of Fevers.” Another writer, in a work
entitled, “The Curiosities of Common Water,” published in 1723, speaks
of water as an “excellent remedy which will perform cures with very
little trouble, and without any charge,” and “may be truly styled, an
universal remedy.” Both French and German writers were zealously
advocating the use of water as a remedy for many diseases at this same
period. Many of the French surgeons had also discovered the immense
utility of water in surgery, receiving their first lessons of
instruction from an ignorant and superstitious miller, who used water in
conjunction with charms.
In the latter part of the last century, Drs. Jackson and Currie each
published reports of cases of fever in which they had found the use of
the bath a remedy of remarkable efficacy. Dr. Currie obtained many
followers for a time, but no very deep impression was made upon the
public mind, though his cases were authentic, and were very ably
reported.
About the end of the first quarter of the present century, a native of
Græfenberg, Prussia, by the name of Priessnitz, met with an accident by
which three of his ribs were broken. He treated himself by applications
of cold water, and then tried the same remedy upon others in similar
cases. His success encouraged him to make further experiments, and
though an ignorant peasant, his natural acuteness enabled him to devise
various means for applying water to the body, and to suit the
application to different diseases. His increasing success attracted
numerous patients, and his fame became, in a few years, worldwide. Many
of his methods were very rude, and his ignorance of medical science
often led him into errors; but he succeeded in restoring to health
hundreds of patients whose maladies had been pronounced incurable.
The interest in the new method became so great that numerous other
individuals, equally ignorant and possessing less shrewdness, undertook
to imitate the German innovator. Some of them were successful, many of
them were not; all were alike in committing numerous blunders through
ignorance of scientific medicine. But the public attention was called to
the utility of water as a remedial agent so forcibly that a powerful
impression was produced in its favor. From that time until the present,
the use of water has been largely in the hands of unscientific empirics
who have advocated it as a specific, and employed it to the exclusion of
other remedies in a great degree. This course, together with many other
gross errors connected with the practice, has deterred scientific
physicians from employing it sufficiently to test its merits, only in a
few exceptional instances.
The friends of Priessnitz claimed for him a great discovery; but as we
have seen, he discovered nothing which was not known a century before,
if not, indeed, some thousands of years previous. It is doing Priessnitz
no injustice to say that he did little or nothing toward establishing
principles, but followed, chiefly, a routine method of practice.
Some scientific members of the medical profession have investigated the
subject in some degree, however, at various times, and the result has
been that at the present day the utility of water is a well-recognized
fact, and it is now often prescribed in the standard text-books as an
excellent remedy for many diseased conditions. Yet, that there is still
a want of appreciation of the remedy is fully attested by the
infrequency of its use by the regular profession. This neglect may be
due in part to a prejudice which the members of the regular profession
have acquired, on account of the quackery which has too often been
connected with the use of this remedy. Nevertheless, there is no good
reason why an efficient remedial agent should be suffered to receive the
stigma which properly attaches only to those who are responsible for its
abuse.
REMEDIAL PROPERTIES.
The value of a drug is judged by its medicinal properties. The more
properties it has, and the more powerful its “action,” the more valuable
it is considered to be. We need not here enter into a discussion of the
nature of medicinal properties, since there is no question among
scientific physicians, that the medicinal properties—so-called—of drugs,
or their effects upon the human system in diseases, are, in general, the
result of vital resistance on the part of the system, an attempt to
expel or remove the poison, or defend itself against it. Water also
possesses remedial properties, some of which are due to vital
resistance, while others grow out of the aid which it affords the vital
organs by its physical properties. As its value as a curative agent
depends upon these properties, it is important to know what they are.
_Refrigerant._—Refrigerant or antiphlogistic medicines are used for the
purpose of diminishing the heat of the body. The most they can do is to
so depress and paralyze the vital forces as to diminish the _production_
of animal heat. Water, when applied at a proper temperature—any
temperature less than 98°—not only diminishes the production of heat,
but removes the superfluous heat by conduction. There is not a drug in
the whole materia medica that will diminish the temperature of the body
so readily and so efficiently as water. How this is effected, has been
previously explained in considering the physiological effects of water.
_Sedative._—Drugs, the administration of which is followed by a
diminished action of the heart, are termed sedatives. They comprise the
most powerful poisons known. Their sedative effects are the result of
their poisonous influence upon the heart or the nerve centers
controlling it. Water is a much more efficient sedative, and its use is
never followed by poisonous effects, as is the use of sedative drugs,
the “action” of which is often very uncertain. By the cool or cold bath,
the pulse may often be reduced twenty to forty beats in a few minutes.
_Tonic._—Water may be used in such a way as to increase the rapidity of
the circulation and the temperature very quickly and powerfully. The hot
bath is a most efficient stimulant, in the true sense of the word. It
will so excite the circulation as to increase the pulse from seventy to
one hundred and fifty in fifteen minutes. The tonic effects of a cool
bath are well appreciated by all who have ever enjoyed it.
_Anodyne._—Certain drugs are called anodyne because they diminish
nervous sensibility, thus relieving pain. Water applied in the form of a
hot fomentation will not infrequently give relief when every drug has
failed. Applied in various other ways, it is very effectual in allaying
nervous irritability.
_Antispasmodic._—No remedy is so certainly successful in hysterical
convulsions as water. In infantile convulsions, its success is also
unrivaled. In cramp, and even in puerperal convulsions, its utility has
been well demonstrated.
_Astringent._—The value of cold water in arresting hemorrhage is well
attested by all physicians.
_Laxative._—Used in various ways, water is very effectual in producing
movement of the bowels, but never occasions those violent and unpleasant
symptoms which accompany and succeed the use of purgatives.
_Emetic._—In the great majority of cases, no other emetic is needed, and
no better can be found.
_Eliminative._—Water is a most perfect eliminative. It dissolves the
excrementitious and other foreign elements of the blood, and thus
materially aids in their elimination. Hence, it is a very useful
_diaphoretic_, increasing the action of the skin, and is equally
valuable as a _diuretic_, having the same effect upon the kidneys.
_Alterative._—For a long period, mercury has been considered as the
champion alterative of the materia medica. It must yield the place to
water, however; for the most it can do is to destroy the elements of the
blood, while water not only accelerates waste, but increases
construction in the same proportion, according to the experiments of
Prof. Liebig.
_Derivative._—One of the most important properties of water applications
is their powerful derivative effect. No other application, internal or
external, can equal them in efficiency and certainty of action.
There are very few agents which possess so many remedial properties as
water. There are none which effect so much with so little expense to the
vital powers of the patient. Many drugs will produce results similar to
those obtained by the use of water, and thus accomplish good, no doubt;
but at the same time, they often work so much mischief in the system
that the evil done is frequently much greater than the good
accomplished. The aim of the faithful physician should be to accomplish
for his patient the greatest amount of good at the least expense of
vitality; and it is an indisputable fact that in a large number of cases
water is just the agent with which this desirable end can be obtained.
=Testimony of Eminent Physicians.=—The testimonies of Currie, Jackson,
and numerous other physicians of the last century have already been
quoted in favor of water. There are numerous practitioners of the
present day who are equally favorable to this remedial agent. Perhaps we
cannot do better than to quote from the _Health Reformer_ the following
paragraphs of an abstract report of a paper read before the New York
Academy of medicine, by Prof. Austin Flint, M. D., president of the
society, the title of the paper being, “The Researches of Currie, and
Recent Views Concerning the Use of Cold Water”:—
“Currie employed scientific methods in observing the phenomena of
disease. He was one of the first to employ the thermometer in studying
disease, and his observations can be received as reliable.
“The use of water externally as a means of reducing the temperature of
the body in disease has recently been coming quite prominently into
notice. According to Liebermeister, a noted German medical author,
Currie was the first to systematize the use of water. His work was
published in 1797. Liebermeister, in his recent article on typhoid
fever, accords to cold water the first place in importance as an article
for reducing the temperature. The use of water for this purpose is at
present attracting much attention; and it is safe to predict that _it
will soon occupy an important place as a remedial agent_.
“Much harm has been done by the ‘rude empiricism’ of Priessnitz, and the
various water cures in the country; though much good has also been
accomplished by the latter institutions, and they have in a measure
prepared the public mind for the general introduction of water as a
remedial agent.
“After the publication of the views of Currie in 1797, his method of
practice, which was chiefly hydropathic, became quite general, but it
was soon nearly forgotten. Trousseau recommended water treatment in
scarlatina, and the use of the remedy has continued to be recommended in
the text-books; but as a measure of treatment in practice, it has become
nearly obsolete. It is, however, obvious that unless we accept the
absurd proposition that diseases have changed since Currie’s time, the
remedy which he recommended so highly must be just as efficient now as
then.
“Dr. Currie made use of the cold douche in fevers, applying it
vigorously to the patient while in the height of the fever, and
continuing it until the temperature became decreased, as indicated by
the thermometer and the pulse. He treated seven cases of continued fever
by this method at the Liverpool Infirmary. All recovered. In an epidemic
of typhoid fever among a regiment of troops, he treated fifty-eight
cases, using the cool tepid douche in all but two cases. The latter
died. The remaining fifty-six recovered, the disease being greatly
shortened in more than half the cases.
“Dr. Currie asserted that, in small-pox, the use of the bath afforded
instant relief to the patient, and caused the disease to assume a
benignant form.
“He found the cold bath always effectual in tetanus and convulsions, as
also in hysteria.
“In temporary insanity from the use of liquor, this acute observer found
that the cold plunge was the most efficient remedy for the worst cases.
“But Dr. Currie’s practice was not confined to _cold_ water. He observed
that affusion with tepid water was not only a more pleasant application,
but that it was even more effectual in reducing unnatural heat than cold
water, as it produced no reaction, not being at all stimulating in
character.
“With regard to the efficacy of this agent, Dr. Currie stated that by
its use in fevers the pulse would be reduced thirty or forty beats, with
a corresponding decrease of temperature and almost immediately relief of
headache.
“In his second volume, published some six years after his first volume,
Dr. Currie declared that although his experience in the use of water,
especially in fevers, had been very extensive, he had had only four
fatal cases in which water was employed, and had never met with a single
evidence of its being in the least degree objectionable or injurious.
Neither had he found that it had been thought to be objectionable by
those whom he had treated. He details a very interesting account of his
treatment of scarlatina in the cases of his two sons, aged,
respectively, three and five years. He gave the older, in thirty-two
hours, fourteen affusions, varying from cold to tepid. Twelve were found
to be sufficient for the younger one. Both became convalescent in three
days.
“It was established by Currie that by the use of water the course of
typhoid fever may be abbreviated. This is not even claimed for the
modern remedies in common use.
“In referring to his own experience in the use of water, Dr. F.
remarked, ‘The relation of my own experience will of necessity be stated
in a few words, as my employment of the remedy has heretofore been much
more limited than it will be in the future if my life is spared.’ He
then related some very interesting cases in which he had employed water
as the chief remedy with the most excellent success. He also took
occasion to recommend, as one of the best means of applying water in
fevers, the wet-sheet pack as employed in the various hydropathic
institutions of the country. He had used the continued cold pack in a
number of the worst cases of sun-stroke in Bellevue Hospital with marked
success. This remedy is still employed there in this class of cases.
“In a case of obstinate remittent fever, which was not in the least
benefited by the thorough use of quinia, he employed the cool pack
thirty-five times in a week, continuing each application from ten to
thirty minutes, and always with great relief to the patient, although he
finally died [perhaps from the huge doses of quinine previously given].
He expressed the opinion that if he had employed the pack more
thoroughly, making the applications longer and more frequent, the
patient might have recovered.
“Currie announced a true theory when he said that _the voice of nature
should not be superseded by theories_. He advocated the free use of
water as a beverage in febrile diseases [fever] as an important remedial
agent. Dr. F. unhesitatingly advanced the belief that the chief benefit
derived from the numerous mineral waters so largely used was only that
which was due to the properties of pure water. He stated as proof that
it was not long since demonstrated by chemical analysis that the only
thing peculiar about the water of a certain spring, famous for medicinal
virtues, was its remarkable purity. He also suggested the introduction
of distilled water for cooking and drinking purposes as a necessary
sanitary measure.
“Dr. F. then related a remarkable case of acute inflammation of the
kidneys in which the patient exhibited the characteristic symptoms of
poisoning from the retention of urea. After other remedies were tried in
vain, the patient’s life was saved by the simple administration of water
as a beverage at short intervals. The diuretic effects of the water soon
washed away the poison and gave immediate relief.”
“After the conclusion of the paper, by Dr. Flint, the venerable Dr.
Richards arose and gave his experience in the use of water. His ideas of
hydropathy were obtained when he has a young man, from Dr. Currie’s
works. He adopted the practice of Dr. C. at that time in an epidemic of
typhoid fever, and with such remarkable success as to astonish old
practitioners. He stated that he had cured more than one hundred cases
of obstinate constipation by simply directing the patient to drink a
glass of cold water half an hour before breakfast, each morning. In one
of these cases the patient had not had a natural passage from the bowels
for a number of years; but he was effectually cured, by the simple
remedy mentioned, in the course of a few months.
“Dr. Loyle gave an interesting resumé of ten years’ experience in the
use of water, with uniform success, especially in convulsions and
scarlatina. He had employed water alone in about one hundred cases of
acute inflammation of the kidneys and dropsy after scarlatina, and with
wonderful success in every case. He had found it equally successful in
coma, restoring consciousness when life was apparently extinct. During
the late war, he on one occasion renovated twenty ambulance loads of
exhausted soldiers who had fallen on the march, by the judicious use of
water. He recommended water most highly as an excellent diuretic and a
capital regulator of the bowels, far superior to ‘after-dinner pills.’
He commended it also as an efficient remedy for sun-stroke and frozen
feet.
“The sentiment of the audience—which was wholly composed of medical
gentlemen—was shown by the hearty applause with which the remarks of
each speaker were received.”
We might add much other medical testimony; but as we could give no
higher authority than the distinguished Dr. Flint, who stands at the
head of medical practice in America, being author of the standard
American text-book on practical medicine, we will not weary the reader
with further quotations. The German physicians, as well as German
medical works, abound with tributes to the value of water. American
medical journals are full of accounts of the beneficial results
following its use in fevers and numerous other diseased conditions.
In surgery, the employment of water is rapidly gaining entire
precedence. It has replaced nearly all other kinds of dressing for
wounds, and its use has saved a valuable limb to many a poor sufferer
who must otherwise have submitted to amputation.
In short, wherever it is faithfully and intelligently applied, water is
working wonders. Yet it is still little used in comparison with its
importance. Especially is its use neglected in chronic diseases. The
only reason we have been able to discover for this neglect of a remedy,
the merits of which are so well demonstrated and generally acknowledged,
is that its use is more troublesome and laborious than the use of drugs.
A half-dozen purgative pills are administered much more easily than an
enema. The administration of a diaphoretic powder is far more convenient
than a pack. A blister is easier to manage than a fomentation. But the
true physician, who has at heart the real good of his patient, will not
sacrifice the safety or comfort of the latter to his own personal
convenience.
ERRORS IN WATER CURE.
Much of the prejudice against the use of water in treating disease has
grown out of abuses of the remedy, and the putting forward of absurd
claims by ignorant persons professing to understand its use. In order to
vindicate the character of this powerful curative agent, it is necessary
to expose the errors and ignorance of those who have abused it.
=“Cold Water Doctors.”=—In the early days of the modern water cure
practice, which was very largely introduced by Priessnitz, cold water
was the universal remedy. No matter what the nature of the disease, or
the condition or temperament of the patient, the remedy was the same. At
the establishment of the Græfenberg doctor, ice-cold douches,
precipitated from a height of sixteen to eighteen feet, the plunge,
directly supplied by the cold mountain springs, and the shower bath of
the same temperature, were all administered to patients with little
discrimination of modifying circumstances, in rooms unwarmed by
artificial heat, even in the depths of the coldest mountain winters. As
Græfenberg was the source whence most water doctors of that time drew
their knowledge, the same practice was pursued elsewhere. The
unreasonableness of such a course was perceived by the more judicious,
and thus its influence was prejudicial.
=Heroic Treatment.=—Such treatment as that described in the preceding
paragraph could not result otherwise than disastrously in numerous
cases. The evil effects were sometimes seen at once, but more frequently
they appeared after periods more or less remote. In some cases, patients
were led to drink twenty or thirty glasses of cold water before
breakfast, under the absurd doctrine that the evils of a small excess
would be cured by greater indulgence. Hundreds of persons adopted the
practice of daily bathing in cold water in a cold room, even in the
coldest weather. A few even went so far as to spring from their warm
beds on the coldest mornings, run to a neighboring brook in a state of
nudity, and plunge into its frigid waters through a hole in the ice. So
infatuated were these enthusiasts, they really thought they enjoyed this
refrigerating process; but, generally, a few years’ continuance of it
was sufficient to produce such a “sedative” effect upon their systems
that some became the victims of consumption and other constitutional
diseases, while others were compelled to discontinue the practice from
absolute inability to continue it. A few of the more vigorous were
enabled to survive this violent treatment without apparent injury for a
long time; but those of weaker vital powers soon showed the results of
its evil effects.
By such processes, together with the cold sitz bath, the dry pack, and
other harsh measures, the patient was sometimes brought to the very
verge of the grave.
Strange as it may appear, those who have been the strongest opponents of
the use of water, themselves afford the best instances of its excessive
use. For instance, in a case of low typhus fever, a “regular” physician
ordered the patient, a young woman, to be immersed in cold water for
half an hour. The attendants attempted to carry out the prescription,
but in a few moments her symptoms became so alarming that the patient
was removed from the bath. It will not be considered remarkable that she
died. A prominent New York physician, a professor of practice in one of
the largest medical colleges in America, in a report of a case of
remittent fever which he had treated with water, said that he
administered thirty-five cold packs in a week. The patient died; but the
doctor thought that if he had been more thorough in his treatment,
giving more packs and longer ones, he would have lived. Another
professor, of a rival college in the same city, cited, in a public
lecture, a case of pneumonia which was treated hydropathically by a
regular physician of note. The patient, while very feeble, was placed in
a cold bath. He was taken out shivering, and died an hour afterward. His
conclusion was that water was a very hazardous remedy. We would
certainly agree with the professor’s conclusion if the case cited were
an example of the _proper_ use of water. In the preceding case, we will
not say that the packs were not beneficial; but if they had been thus
used by a professed hydropathist, the treatment would have been
pronounced decidedly heroic by “regulars.”
=Crisis.=—By the violent processes which have been mentioned, the
patient was frequently brought into a condition similar to that produced
by the old process of depletion by bleeding, antimony, mercury, and
purgatives. Painful skin eruptions, boils, and carbuncles, often covered
the whole body. Acute pains racked the body of the patient from head to
foot. If he survived this “crisis,” he usually got well, which was
regarded as an evidence of the salutary effect of the crisis, and so it
became an important object to be attained; and the worse a patient felt,
the more certain and speedy, he was encouraged to believe, would be his
recovery. No account was taken of the immense waste of vital energy
during these painful morbid processes.
The use of the abdominal bandage, continued for a long time until an
eruption is produced, is another means by which some have sought to
effect a cure of their patients. This course is pursued under the belief
that the discharge occurring from the surface which thus becomes
diseased is a vicarious means of removing impurities from the system—an
absurd notion which no one acquainted with the first principles of
physiology and surgical pathology could entertain for a moment.
=Hydropathic Quacks.=—Unfortunately for the reputation of water as a
remedy, its use has been largely in the hands of empirics who have used
it in a routine manner, and have supposed it to be a cure-all, and the
only remedy of any value. At least, such have been the claims made for
it. This has served to bring it into disrepute, the disgrace which ought
to attach to individuals being applied by an undiscriminating public to
the innocent victim of abuse.
=Ignorance.=—The greatest bane of all has been the ignorance of those
who have professed to be qualified to administer water as a remedy
understandingly. Priessnitz himself was an ignorant peasant. He was
innocent of either anatomical or surgical knowledge. His slight
acquaintance with physiology was gathered by cursory observations of
patients. Of the effects of water he knew more, studying them with a
good degree of acuteness. His lamentable want of knowledge allowed him
to fall into many errors. It is related of him that he treated hopeless
cases of solid anchylosis of joints just as though they were mere cases
of stiffness from rheumatism. Cases of hopeless organic disease, he
pronounced curable and submitted to long but unavailing treatment, not
knowing the real nature of the disease. A young lady died of what he
supposed an internal abscess. No abscess was found, upon which he
remarked that “she had too short a neck for long life.”
It could be no wonder, then, that the disciples of such a master should
be sadly lacking in many of those qualifications essential for a
successful physician, no matter what the remedies employed. The most
lamentable feature of the matter is that the same ignorance has
continued to be, with few exceptions, characteristic of those who have
employed water as a remedy; this has been especially disastrous because
a man with the native shrewdness and acuteness of perception of
Priessnitz has rarely appeared in the ranks of hydropathists.
=A Popular Error.=—It is a grievous popular error that any one can apply
water as skillfully as the most experienced physician, and that its
successful use requires no knowledge of the structure and functions of
the human body. No doubt this has grown out of another error, perhaps
quite as common; viz., that water is so simple a remedy that it will do
no harm if it does no good. Such notions have frequently led to most
disastrous results. Water, as already shown, is one of the most powerful
remedies. And while it is, undoubtedly, far safer in the hands of the
uneducated than blisters, purgatives, diuretics, and such agents as
opium, chloral, alcohol, and most other drugs, yet it certainly requires
careful usage, and the more scientific knowledge the user possesses, the
more skillfully will he be able to apply it. It is, furthermore, true
that a great majority of ordinary diseases are commonly so void of
danger under careful nursing and hygienic management that the
application of water is a simple matter which any intelligent mother can
perform successfully. A case is related by good authority of a person
who fell in apoplexy an hour after taking an excessively hot bath.
Another patient became a paralytic from the same cause. Water is a
remedy which cannot be safely used by one who has not informed himself
of its effects, and of the proper modes of application.
=Absurd Claims.=—Sensible people have been rightfully disgusted with the
claims which have been made by certain pretentious ones for the use of
water. One declares that the bath will dissolve out of the body mineral
substances which have been taken into it. Another claims to have been
able, by the application of fomentations to a rheumatic knee, to extract
in regular order the ointments which had previously been successively
applied. Numerous other claims equally preposterous might be related, if
it were necessary. They have all tended to excite a feeling of contempt
for a means of treating disease which is really worthy of the highest
estimation.
=Neglect of Other Remedies.=—As has been previously remarked, many seem
to have forgotten that water is not the only remedy for disease, and not
only attempt to cure every disease by its application, but use it to the
exclusion of all other remedies. In nearly all cases, sunlight, pure
air, rest, exercise, proper food, and other hygienic agencies are quite
as important as water. Electricity, too, is a remedy which should not be
ignored; and skillful surgery is absolutely indispensable in not a small
number of cases. Even drugs are sometimes useful auxiliaries, though,
doubtless, infinitely more harm has resulted from the employment of
drugs in conjunction with water treatment than from their omission.
_Rational Hydropathy_ leaves room for every other remedy of value. It
does not regard water as a specific nor as a panacea, but only as one of
the most valuable of numerous excellent remedies. It discards the
erroneous and harmful practices of empirics and ignorant charlatans,
whether they concern water or other agents, and gives to the aqueous
element only its due share of importance.
APPLICATIONS OF WATER.
The indications which are to be met in the treatment of disease are
chiefly those enumerated below; and how admirably they are met by
applications of water may be easily demonstrated by following the
directions given.
=1. Equalization of Circulation.=—Disease cannot exist without some
disturbance of the circulation. In perfect health each part receives its
due share of blood. One of the first indications in disease, then, is to
balance the circulation. If an organ contains too much blood, the
application of cold water to the part will occasion contraction of the
minute vessels of the part, and thus the amount of blood is lessened, as
explained more at length in considering the physiological effects of
water.
Or, the part may be relieved by the application of warm water in some
form to adjacent or remote parts of the body, by which means the surplus
blood will be drawn to other parts, thus relieving the suffering organ.
Again, if an organ contains too little blood, the opposite course must
be pursued. Warm or hot applications are made to the part, while cold
applications may be made to other parts if necessary. Very often the two
remedies may be advantageously combined, since one part cannot contain
too much blood without some other part or parts being deprived of the
due proportion, and _vice versa_; so that while a cold application is
needed at one part, the opposite is required at another.
=2. Regulation of Temperature.=—As the condition of the bodily
temperature is closely associated with that of the circulation, the two
are usually controlled by the same remedies applied in the same manner.
A part which contains too much blood has usually, also, too high a
degree of heat. The cold application relieves both. If the entire
surface of the body is involved, the application must be as extensive as
necessary to affect the whole. In general fevers, the admirable
adaptation of water to this end is well exhibited. When the temperature
of the body rises above 100°, or even above 98°, a cooling bath should
be resorted to. It may consist of a simple sponging with water, scarcely
below the bodily temperature, an affusion with tepid water, a full bath
of a tepid, temperate, or cold temperature, or some other form of
cooling application according to the degree of cooling effect desired.
Any temperature below 98° will be cooling. In general, it is better to
employ a bath only a few degrees below the bodily temperature, as its
application will not be followed by an increase of heat, called
reaction, which follows a brief application of a cool bath. To obtain
the proper cooling effects of a cool or cold bath, it must be continued
for some time, from ten minutes to half an hour, at least. The same
remark applies also to the application of cool baths for the purpose of
equalizing the circulation.
=3. Removal of Pain.=—Pain is usually dependent upon disturbance of the
circulation, being caused by the pressure of overfilled vessels upon the
nerves in a confined space. Pain may be relieved by either hot or cold
applications. The first object should be to remove the surplus blood, by
local cold applications, and remote hot ones. If this plan is not
successful, relief will be obtained by a hot local application, which
operates by relaxing the surrounding tissues, so that the nerve fibers
are relieved from pressure, as well as by quickening the local
circulation, and so relieving congestion. The latter method is usually
most quickly successful; but it is not so radically curative as the
former. Pain dependent on passive congestion will be best relieved by
the method next described.
=4. To Excite Activity.=—Many organs often become torpid or inactive, as
the skin and liver, especially. Sometimes the blood-vessels of an organ
become relaxed and inactive, passive congestion resulting. No remedy
will so readily induce a return of activity to the affected parts as
alternate hot and cold applications, continued for some minutes, fifteen
to thirty or more. This is one of the best applications for the relief
of old pains.
=5. Removal of Obstructions.=—A very large class of diseases are
attributable to obstruction in various organs, caused by the reception
of foreign matters into the system, and the accumulation of the natural
waste of the tissues. The warm bath, to remove, external obstructions,
and the internal use of water as a solvent for internal sources of
obstruction, are the remedies which will achieve success in nearly all
cases. Offending substances in the stomach are readily removed by the
water emetic; and hardened accumulations in the large intestine are
removed with equal facility by means of the enema.
=6. Dilution of the Blood.=—In fevers, cholera, and other diseases, the
blood often becomes abnormally thickened, dark, and viscid, circulating
with difficulty, and not imparting due nourishment to the tissues.
Nothing but water can remedy this difficulty. It may be got into the
blood by absorption from the skin, if the mucous membrane of the stomach
will not absorb it.
=7. Influence on the Nervous System.=—Finally, it is often important to
affect certain organs through their nervous centers. Water, properly
applied, will accomplish this also. A fomentation applied to the abdomen
will often remove headache, and is an excellent remedy for general
nervousness, seeming to affect the whole system, just as does galvanic
electricity when applied to the same locality, doubtless through the
large nervous ganglia located in that region.
Some physicians claim to have obtained peculiar results by the
application of heat or cold to the spine. It is said, for example, that
cold applied to any portion of the spine will produce an increased
circulation in the portion of the body supplied with organic nerves from
the part. Hot applications to the spine are said to produce a contrary
effect upon corresponding organs. Perhaps there should be still further
observations upon this subject before any attempt is made to establish a
definite law. It is well known that applications of ice to the spine is
an excellent remedy for chorea, and several other nervous diseases.
For general nervous irritability, or nervousness, the _warm_ full bath
may be applied with uniform success. Neither hot nor cold applications
are generally useful in such cases.
=Temperature of Baths.=—The thermometer is the only accurate measure of
temperature; hence the importance of its use in the administration of
baths. Yet the thermometer may be abused. A given temperature may seem
warm to one individual and tepid or cool to another. The same difference
of sensation will occur in the same individual on different occasions.
What seems cool to-day will be thought warm to-morrow. The
susceptibility of the body to sensations of heat and cold largely
depends upon its condition and the temperature of surrounding objects.
In consequence of this physiological fact, it is improper to attempt, as
some have done, to fix certain exact temperatures at which baths must be
given to all persons under all conditions.
For convenience and perspicuity, the temperatures of baths have been
divided into six grades, as given in the following table by Forbes; all
who attempt to use the bath according to the directions should carefully
learn and preserve the distinctions here made:—
1. Cold Bath, 33° to 60° F.
2. Cool, 60° „ 75°
3. Temperate, 75° „ 85°
4. Tepid, 85° „ 92°
5. Warm, 92° „ 98°
6. Hot, 98° „ 112°
The vapor bath ranges from 98° to 120°; the hot-air or Turkish bath from
100° to 160°, or even higher, though not usefully so.
A bath of any temperature above the natural heat of the body, 98°, is a
hot bath. At 32°, water becomes ice; a bath is very rarely given at this
temperature, and then the application should be made to only a small
surface. Water at 32°, and even ice and snow, may be usefully employed
as topical remedies in local diseases. It will rarely be necessary to
employ a full bath at a lower temperature than 65°, which will usually
seem very cold to the patient. A temperature from 85° to 95° is the most
generally useful for baths which involve a considerable portion of the
body, though of course higher temperatures are employed in local
applications.
=How to Determine the Temperature of a Bath without a Thermometer.=—It
is often necessary to administer a bath when a thermometer cannot be
obtained. In such cases it is customary to test the temperature by
placing the hand in the water. This is an unreliable method, however;
for the hand becomes, by usage, so obtuse to heat that water which would
seem only warm to it would be painfully hot to the body of the patient.
To avoid this source of error, it is only necessary to plunge the arm to
the elbow into the water, by which means its real temperature will be
determined. Water which causes redness of the skin is hot; when it feels
simply comfortable, with no special sensation of either heat or cold, it
is warm. Slightly cooler than this, it is tepid. When it causes the
appearance of goose-flesh, it may be for practical purposes called cool,
a still lower degree being cold.
_Another Method._—The method about to be described is somewhat more
accurate than the preceding, and may be found convenient for
facilitating the preparation of a bath of proper quantity as well as
temperature, a matter which though simple enough is often quite annoying
to inexperienced persons. It is a fact of common knowledge that water
boils at 212° F. Boiling water, then, is always of this temperature.
Well and spring water, and the water of cisterns in winter, does not
vary greatly from 53°. The temperature of well and spring water changes
very slightly with the seasons. By combining in proper quantities water
of these known temperatures, any required temperature may be produced.
Not having seen this method suggested before, we have prepared the
following table, which may perhaps be used to advantage in the absence
of a thermometer; we advise all to obtain and use a thermometer,
however, when it is possible to do so:—
Tem. 53°. Tem. 212°.
2 qts. added to 1 qt. equals 3 qts. at 106°
2½ „ „ 1 „ „ 3½ „ 98°
3 „ „ 1 „ „ 4 „ 93°
4 „ „ 1 „ „ 5 „ 85°
5 „ „ 1 „ „ 6 „ 80°
6 „ „ 1 „ „ 7 „ 76°
8 „ „ 1 „ „ 9 „ 71°
When larger quantities are needed, it is only necessary to multiply each
of the combining quantities by the same number. For instance, if a
gallon and a half of water is needed for a foot bath at 106°, pour into
a pail or bath-tub four quarts of fresh well water and then add two
quarts of boiling water. If four gallons of water are wanted for a sitz
bath at 93° (a very common temperature), pour into the bath-tub three
gallons of fresh well or spring water, and add one gallon of boiling
water. Thus any required quantity can be obtained at the temperatures
given. The cold water should be placed in the vessel first, and there
should be no delay in adding the hot water, as it would rapidly lose its
heat, and thus make a larger quantity necessary. Determinate measurement
is not essential. The cold and hot water may be added alternately in
proper proportions, being measured by the same vessel until the
requisite quantity is prepared.
RULES FOR BATHING.
The following general rules should be carefully studied and thoroughly
understood by any one who expects to employ the bath. Much injury to
health and most of the discredit cast upon the use of water as a remedy
have arisen from a disregard of some of them:—
1. A full bath should never be taken within two or three hours after a
meal.
2. Such local baths as fomentations, compresses, foot baths, and even
sitz baths, may be taken an hour or two after a meal; indeed, compresses
and fomentations may be applied almost immediately after a light meal,
without injury.
3. Employ the thermometer to determine the temperature of every bath
when possible to do so; if not, employ the other methods described.
4. The temperature of the room during a bath should be 70° to 85°.
Invalids require a warmer room than persons in health. Thorough
ventilation is an important matter; but draughts must be carefully
prevented, by screens of netting placed before openings into the room
when necessary.
5. Never apply either very cold or excessively hot treatment to aged or
feeble patients. Cold is especially dangerous.
6. Hot baths are rarely useful in health. The warm bath answers all the
requirements of cleanliness.
7. Never take a cold bath when exhausted or chilly. A German emperor
lost his life by taking a cool bath after a fatiguing march. Alexander
came near losing his life in the same manner. Many have been rendered
cripples for life by so doing. No harm will result from a cool bath if
the body is simply warm, even though it may be in a state of
perspiration. Contrary to the common opinion, a considerable degree of
heat is the best possible preparation for a cold bath. The Finlanders
rush out of their hot ovens—sweat-houses—and roll in the snow, without
injury.
8. Cold baths should not be administered during the period of
menstruation in females. At such times, little bathing of any kind is
advisable with the exception of a warm or tepid sponge bath, or such
treatment as may be advised by a physician.
9. Bath attendants should carefully avoid giving “shocks” to nervous
people or to those inclined to apoplexy or affected with heart disease.
Shocks are unpleasant and unnecessary for any one.
10. Never apply to the head such treatment as will cause shock, as the
sudden cold douche, shower, or spray bath.
11. A light hand bath every morning will be none too frequent to
preserve scrupulous bodily cleanliness. More than a week should never be
allowed to elapse without a bath with warm water and soap.
12. The best time for treatment—especially cool treatment—is about three
hours after breakfast.
13. Always employ for bathing purposes the purest water attainable. Soft
water is greatly preferable to hard on many accounts.
14. Those not strong and vigorous should avoid drinking freely of cold
water just previous to a bath.
15. The head should always be wet before any bath; and the feet should
be warmed—if not already warm—by a hot foot bath, if necessary.
16. In applying a bath to sick persons, it should always be made of a
temperature agreeable to the feelings.
17. One very important element in the success of a bath is the dexterity
of the attendant. The patient should be inspired with confidence both in
the bath and in the skill of the attendant. The mind has much to do with
the effect of a bath.
18. In general baths, the patient, unless feeble, will derive benefit by
assisting himself as much as possible.
19. Patients should receive due attention during a bath, so that they
may not feel that they are forgotten. Nervous patients often become very
apprehensive on this account. It is also important, in most cases, that
a reasonable degree of quietude should be maintained.
20. When any unusual or unexpected symptoms appear during a bath, the
patient should be removed at once.
21. In case symptoms of faintness appear, as is sometimes the case in
feeble patients, during a hot bath, apply cold water to the head and
face, give cool water to drink, lower the temperature of the bath by
adding cool water, and place the patient as nearly as possible in a
horizontal position.
22. The temperature of a warm or hot bath should always be decreased
just before its termination as a precaution against taking cold.
23. In health, a cool or cold bath should be very brief, lasting not
more than one or two minutes. A tepid bath should last not more than ten
or fifteen minutes. A warm bath may be continued thirty or forty
minutes, or even longer, but nothing could be more absurd than the
custom prevailing in some places of prolonging the bath to great length.
At Pfeffers and Leuck, in Switzerland, many persons spend the whole day
in the water, taking their meals on floating tables, and occupying their
time in reading, playing chess, and other games. Some remain in the
water as many as sixteen hours out of the twenty-four. Of course,
certain baths may be advantageously prolonged in cases of disease; but
no intelligent physician will now recommend the antiquated practice
which we sometimes see represented by a patient seated in a tub, with an
open book in hand.
24. It is of extreme importance that the patient should be carefully
dried after any bath. A large sheet is much better for this purpose than
a towel. An old linen or cotton sheet is preferable to a new one, being
softer. Full directions are given under the heading, “Dry
Rubbing-Sheet.”
25. A patient should never be left chilly after a bath. Rub until warm.
26. It is equally important that the body should not be left in a state
of perspiration, for it will soon become chilly.
27. Patients who are able to do so should exercise a little both before
and immediately after a bath to insure thorough reaction.
28. An hour’s rest soon after a bath will add to its beneficial effects.
It is best to go to bed and cover warm.
29. If a bath is followed by headache and fever, there has been
something wrong, either in the kind of bath administered, or in the
manner of giving it.
30. Very cold and very hot baths are seldom required. The barbarous
practices of half a century ago are now obsolete, or should be, if they
are not quite discontinued as yet. No good resulted from them which
cannot be attained by milder means, and much harm was occasioned which
is avoided by the use of less extreme temperatures.
31. Patients should not be allowed to become dependent on any special
form of bath, as an after-dinner fomentation to aid digestion, the
abdominal bandage, or any other appliance. Destroy such a habit if it
has been formed.
32. Order, cleanliness, dispatch, and a delicate sense of propriety are
items which every bath attendant should keep constantly in mind, and
which will often contribute in no small degree to success in the use of
this agent.
33. Never employ a bath without a definite and legitimate purpose in
view. It is somewhat customary, in many institutions where water is
employed, to apply it in a routine way. Many baths are prescribed for
the sake of producing variety, or pleasing the patient. A faithful and
scientific physician will carefully adapt his remedies to the condition
of his patient, and will observe the results. It seems to be a prevalent
error that it makes little difference how water is applied, provided the
patient is only wet. Warm, hot, tepid, temperate, cool, and cold baths
are used indiscriminately.
So, also, the different modes of administering baths of the same
temperature are disregarded in many cases. In general, each particular
form of bath is especially adapted to the treatment of special
conditions, and it is the best test of the proficiency of a physician,
in the use of water, to observe whether he recognizes the distinctions
between the various kinds of baths, and is able to adapt them to the
appropriate conditions.
34. Giving too much treatment is likely to be the error into which the
inexperienced will fall, rather than the opposite extreme. Nature cannot
be forced to do more than she is capable of doing; and as nature must do
the healing, if a cure is accomplished, remedies should be of a helping
rather than a crowding or forcing nature. The vitality of patients may
be expended uselessly by treatment, for baths excite vital resistance,
as well as drugs, a fact which many overlook. The dangers of
over-treatment are not so great as some imagine, however, who take the
opposite extreme, and advocate _rest_ as the great cure-all. We have
seen patients who seemed to be quite monomaniacs on the subject of “rest
cure,” who needed a good thorough stirring up with useful exercise more
than any other kind of treatment.
GENERAL BATHS.
Baths applied to the whole surface of the body are, as we have already
seen, among the most powerful means of affecting the human system either
in health or disease. Baths of a temperature less than that of the body,
98°, unless of very brief application, uniformly decrease the bodily
temperature. That the diminution of temperature is not merely local,
being confined to the skin and superficial structures, is shown by the
fact that the thermometer indicates a decline of temperature in the
interior of the body as well. The bath diminishes the production of heat
throughout the whole system, besides abstracting large quantities by its
contact with the body, as previously explained. The diminution of
temperature continues for hours after the bath, especially in cases in
which it was excessively high at the time of administration. Hot baths
have, in general, an opposite effect.
SWIMMING.
Swimming is a general bath combined with vigorous exercise, as nearly
all baths should be. It is one of the most healthful kinds of exercise,
if not continued too long, as it frequently is. The temperature of the
water is commonly between 70° and 80° F., which make it a temperate
bath. Its effects are not far different from other forms of bath of the
same temperature. We have not space to devote to a description of the
art, since there are valuable treatises on the subject.
PLUNGE BATH.
The hot baths of the ancient Greeks and Romans were usually followed by
a plunge up to the neck in a large basin of water four or five feet
deep, and large enough to allow the exercise of swimming. Many
hydropathic establishments employ the same bath after packs and sweating
baths. A bath of this kind is not always attainable without great
expense; and it possesses no particular advantage over other methods of
cooling the surface after a warm bath. It is a very severe form of bath
when employed at a low temperature. In the days of Priessnitz, it was
used at a temperature of 45° or 50°. More harm than good would result
from a continuous employment of such treatment. The cool plunge should
be of but a very few minutes’ duration, and the patient should rub
himself vigorously during the bath. In this, as in all other cool baths,
the first contact with the water produces chilliness or shock. After two
or three minutes, or less, this will be followed by a partial reaction,
even while the patient is in the water, accompanied by a feeling of
comfortable warmth. This will shortly be again succeeded by a second
chill, which is not so likely to be followed by prompt reaction; hence,
the patient should always take care to leave the bath before the
occurrence of the second chill, if he would avoid unpleasant
after-effects.
SPONGE BATH.
The sponge or hand bath is perhaps the simplest and most useful mode of
applying water to the surface of the body; for it requires the use of no
appliances which every one does not possess, and it can be employed by
any one without elaborate preparation, and under almost any
circumstances. A great quantity of water is not required; a few quarts
are a plenty, and a pint will answer admirably in an emergency. A soft
sponge, or a linen or cotton cloth, and one or two soft towels, or a
sheet, are the other requisites. The hand may be used in the absence of
a cloth or a sponge for applying the water.
The temperature of the bath should not be above 95°, and 90° is
generally better. Most people can habitually employ a temperature of 75°
or 80° without injury. The use of a much lower temperature is not
commonly advisable, and is often productive of great injury.
Begin the bath, as usual, by wetting the head, saturating the hair well.
Wash the face, then the neck, chest, shoulders, arms, trunk, and back.
Rub vigorously until the skin is red, to prevent chilling; for even when
the temperature of the room is nearly equal to that of the body, the
rapid evaporation of water from the surface will lower the external
temperature very rapidly unless a vigorous circulation is maintained.
After thoroughly bathing the upper portion of the body, turn the
attention to the lower portion, continuing the rubbing of the upper
parts at brief intervals to prevent chilliness. As soon as the bathing
is concluded, envelop the body in a sheet and rub dry, or dry the skin
with a towel. When the surface is nearly or quite dried, rub the whole
vigorously with the bare hand.
The bath should not be prolonged more than ten or fifteen minutes. Five
minutes is sufficient to secure all the benefits of the bath, and even
three minutes will suffice for a very good bath.
Persons who chill easily will find it better to bathe only a portion of
the body before drying it. Some will even find it necessary to retain a
portion of the clothing upon the lower part of the body while bathing
and drying the upper part.
Weakly patients may receive this bath with very little disturbance, even
in bed. Only a small portion of the body should be uncovered at a time,
being bathed, dried, rubbed, and then covered while another part is
treated in a similar manner.
The sponge bath may be administered anywhere without danger of soiling
the finest carpet, by using care to make the sponge or cloth nearly dry
before applying it to the body. A rug may be spread upon the floor as an
extra precaution. When used for cleanliness—as it should be daily—a
little fine soap should be added two or three times a week, to remove
the oleaginous secretion from the skin.
This bath is applicable whenever there is an abnormal degree of bodily
heat, and in such cases may be applied every half-hour without injury.
It is useful in cases of nervousness and sleeplessness, and, in fact,
whenever water is required in any form, it may be used with advantage.
RUBBING WET-SHEET.
This bath is administered in two ways; with the sheet very wet, or
dripping, and with it wrung nearly dry. The first method is frequently
called the dripping-sheet bath. In giving it, proceed as follows:—
When necessary to prevent injury to the floor or carpet, place upon the
floor a large rug or oilcloth. In the center, place a large wash-tub, in
the absence of a more convenient vessel. While the patient is making
himself ready for the bath, procure two large cotton sheets. Gather one
end of each into folds so that it can be easily and quickly spread out;
lay one upon a chair close at hand, and place the other in the tub. At a
distance of three or four feet from the tub, place a low stool. Now
place in the tub—if a bath at about 93° is desired, and this will be the
most usual temperature—half a pailful of fresh well or spring water, and
one-third as much boiling water. If a thermometer is at hand it should,
of course, be used to test the temperature. After the patient has wet
his head, let him step into the tub, facing the assistant, with his arms
straight and pressed closely to his sides. Now draw up the wet sheet by
its gathered end to its full length; draw out one side quickly, place
the corner over one shoulder of the patient, and while holding it in
place with one hand, quickly draw the remainder of the sheet around him
with the other, bringing it up well around the neck, and folding the
second corner under the top so as to hold it in place. But a few seconds
should be occupied in applying the sheet. Then commence rubbing the
patient vigorously with both hands, one upon each side, rubbing to and
fro three or four times in each place, passing over the whole body very
rapidly, and then repeating the same, to prevent chilling of any part.
Coarse, robust, and phlegmatic people may be rubbed with a good deal of
severity; but persons with delicate skin and acute sensibilities require
gentler manipulation.
After three or four minutes of energetic rubbing, pour over the chest
and shoulders a pailful of water four or five degrees cooler than that
of the bath, which should be in readiness for instant use. Then rub two
or three minutes longer. Now quickly disengage the wet sheet, allowing
it to drop into the tub. While the patient is stepping upon the stool,
quickly grasp the dry sheet, and by the time he is in place, have him
enveloped in it. Rub him dry, passing over the whole body several times
in rapid succession, to prevent chilling. Care must be taken that every
part is thoroughly dried. The head, armpits, groins, and feet are liable
to escape attention. No moisture should be left between the toes. After
wiping nearly or quite dry, apply the hand-rubbing, as elsewhere
described, using care not to induce perspiration by too vigorous or
long-continued rubbing. If the skin should become moist from
perspiration after having been once dried, gradually lower the
temperature of the room and continue light rubbing until the skin
becomes dry and cool before allowing the patient to dress.
Very few baths afford a better opportunity for the display of skill and
energy on the part of the attendant than this. Some practice is required
to enable one to give it really well.
The other form of rubbing wet-sheet is given in about the same manner,
the only difference being that the sheet is wrung before its
application, and is re-applied one or more times, according as a milder
or more severe form of treatment is required. The douche may be reserved
until the sheet is removed the last time.
One precaution especially necessary to be observed in this bath, as well
as in all others where a tepid application is succeeded by a cooler one,
is frequently overlooked. _The second cooler application should never be
made until there is good reaction from the first._
This is an excellent bath to apply after packs or warm baths which have
induced perspiration, as hot-air and vapor baths. It is especially
applicable to cases in which there is defective circulation in the
extremities, torpid skin and liver, and nervousness. It is of special
benefit in cases of debility accompanied by night sweats.
WET-SHEET PACK.
When properly administered, this is one of the most powerful of all
water appliances. Some skill is needed to apply it with a uniform degree
of success. Two or three comfortables or thick blankets, one woolen
blanket, and a large linen or cotton sheet are the articles necessary.
It is important to be certain that the sheet is sufficiently large to
extend twice around the patient’s body. More blankets are required in
cool weather and by weak patients. Spread upon a bed or straight lounge
the comfortables, one by one, making them even at the top. Over them,
spread the woolen blanket, allowing its upper edge to fall an inch or
two below that of the last comfortable. Wet the sheet in water of the
proper temperature, having gathered the ends so that it can be quickly
spread out. Wring so that it will not drip much, place its upper end
even with the woolen blanket, and spread it out on each side of the
middle sufficiently to allow the patient to lie down upon his back,
which he should quickly do, letting his ears come just above the upper
border of the sheet, and extending his limbs near together. The patient
should then raise his arms, while the attendant draws over one side of
the wet sheet, taking care to bring it in contact with as much of the
body as possible, bringing it closely up beneath the arms, and pressing
it down between the limbs so as to make it come in contact with both
sides of them. Tuck the edge tightly under the patient on the opposite
side, using care not to include the other edge of the sheet. Now let the
patient clasp his hands across his chest, and then bring up the other
side of the sheet. Grasp it by its upper corner with one hand, drawing
it down over the shoulder and lengthwise of the body; then place the
other hand upon the covered shoulder, holding the sheet firmly in place
while the corner is carried upward upon the opposite side and tucked
under the shoulder, thus drawing the upper edge of the sheet well up
under the chin. Tuck the edge of the sheet under the body, carefully
enveloping the feet. Then bring over each side of the blanket and
comfortables in the manner last described, being very careful to exclude
all air at the neck, and allowing the blankets to extend below the feet
so that they can be folded under.
It is not desirable that the patient should be bound as tightly as a
mummy. All that is necessary is the exclusion of air, and as the neck
and feet are the points at which it is most likely to enter, these parts
should receive particular attention, as directed. If too tightly bound,
the patient will be more likely to be nervous than if allowed some
freedom. The application of the wet sheet should be made in a few
seconds, as it cools very rapidly when spread out. The first blanket
should be brought over the patient as soon as possible. If the feet are
not warm, a hot foot bath should be taken before the pack. If they
become cool in the pack, hot jugs, bricks, or stones should be applied
to them. If the patient does not become comfortably warm in a few
minutes—ten or fifteen at most—more blankets should be added, and, if
necessary, dry heat should be applied to the sides. If he still remains
chilly, he should be promptly removed and placed in a warm bath, or
vigorously rubbed with a dry sheet and then placed in a dry pack. The
head should be kept cool by frequent wetting while the patient is in the
bath. If a compress is applied, it should be often renewed.
The temperature of the pack must depend upon the condition of the
patient, being determined by principles elsewhere explained. A woolen
sheet is better for the administration of a hot pack than one of cotton
or linen. The cold pack is very rarely required. The usual temperature
for this bath should be about 92°. It is proper to wet the sheet in
water of about 100°, as it will be cooled several degrees while being
applied.
The duration of the pack should be carefully regulated by the condition
of the patient, the effects desired, and the immediate effects produced.
If the patient becomes very nervous, or sweats excessively, or becomes
faint, or has other seriously unpleasant or dangerous symptoms, he
should be removed from the pack at once if he has not been more than ten
minutes in it. Ordinarily, the pack may continue thirty to forty-five
minutes. If the patient sleeps naturally, he may remain in the pack a
full hour if strong, or even longer in many cases. In fevers, short
packs, frequently repeated, are more beneficial than long ones fewer in
number.
The pack should be followed by the spray, the sponge bath, the douche,
or the rubbing wet-sheet. It is a powerful remedy, and should not be
used to excess in chronic diseases; it has been much abused in this way.
Its depurating effects are really wonderful. The increased action of the
skin, together with determination of blood to that part, is so great
that poisons long hidden in the system are brought out and eliminated.
The odor of a sheet recently used in packing a gross person is often
intolerable. If the patient be a tobacco user, the sheet will be reeking
with the odor of nicotine. Many times, the sheet will be actually
discolored with the impurities withdrawn from the body.
The applications of the pack in treating disease are very numerous. In
almost all acute diseases accompanied by general febrile disturbance,
and in nearly all chronic diseases, it is a most helpful remedy if
rightly managed. It is an admirable remedy for nervousness, skin
diseases, and irritations of the mucous membrane. The warm pack is a
remedy worth more in the treatment of children’s diseases than all the
drugs in the materia medica, as many physicians have proved. It is a
most successful application in convulsions.
SHOWER PACK.
In many cases of fever in which the temperature rises so high as to
produce delirium, the ordinary pack does not seem to be sufficiently
powerful to fully control the excessive heat. In such cases, the shower
pack is found of great service; it is thus used in Bellevue Hospital,
New York:—
A rubber blanket is placed upon an ordinary mattress. Upon this, the
patient is placed, enveloped in a wet sheet, as in the ordinary pack.
Instead of being covered with blankets, however, he is left exposed to
the air, so that the powerful cooling effects of evaporation may be
obtained. As the sheet becomes warmed by the heat of the body, cool
water is showered upon it from a sprinkler or watering-pot. The bath is
continued thus until the temperature of the patient, as indicated by the
thermometer, is sufficiently diminished.
This bath, combining as it does the cooling effects of cool water and of
evaporation, is the most powerful refrigerant that can be employed; yet
it is perfectly safe when judiciously used, being only applied in cases
of extreme urgency on account of the high temperature.
Some practice opening the ordinary pack at intervals, and sprinkling
cool water upon the patient, thus obtaining, in some degree, the
prolonged cooling effect. The pack must be studied well to enable one to
apply it with skill, and certainty of success.
DRY SHEET PACK.
Though this can hardly be called a bath at its commencement, it really
becomes a wet-sheet pack before its termination. Its application differs
from that of the wet-sheet pack in that the patient is wrapped in woolen
blankets instead of the wet sheet. The object of this treatment is to
produce perspiration, which may be encouraged by drinking either cold or
hot drinks in considerable quantity, and by the application of dry
artificial heat to the feet and sides. It is a very severe form of
treatment, and is now seldom practiced. Many years ago, patients at
hydropathic establishments were often kept for several hours in the dry
pack, smothered beneath loads of comfortables, blankets, and
feather-beds. If cautiously employed, it is occasionally useful in
“breaking the chills,” in fever and ague. It should be administered
about half an hour before the time for the beginning of the chill, if
required for this purpose.
The several varieties of local packs are described under the head of
Local Baths.
FULL BATH.
For this bath a tub is required the length of the body, about eighteen
inches deep, two feet wide at the top, and, preferably, six inches
narrower at the bottom. It is better to have the end intended for the
head a little elevated. Place in the tub sufficient water so that the
patient will be entirely covered, with the exception of the head, when
he lies upon his back. During the bath, the body should be vigorously
rubbed by the bather or an attendant, or both, particular pains being
taken to knead and manipulate the abdomen, in a gentle, but thorough
manner. The temperature of the bath, when taken for cleanliness, or for
its soothing effects, should be not more than 95°, and it should be
cooled down to about 85° before the conclusion of the bath, by the
addition of cool water.
Every family ought to possess conveniences for this bath. Indeed, it is
now found in every well-regulated modern house in our large cities. It
is not so expensive but that any one can possess it. Portable baths of
rubber can be obtained which are worth many times their cost. A cheap
bath can be constructed of duck well oiled or covered with paint and
suspended from a frame; but it will be quite unsatisfactory, not being
perfectly water-tight, as such a bath should be for family use. A
stationary bath may be made of wood, of the dimensions given, and lined
with lead or zinc. There should be an opening in the lower end for
withdrawing the water.
The full bath is one of the most refreshing of all baths, being also one
of the most pleasant. Employed at a low temperature, it is a powerful
means of reducing excessive heat in fevers. The hot full bath very
promptly relieves the pains of acute rheumatism, and is almost a
specific for colds, if taken just before retiring. Very hot and very
cold temperatures are quite hazardous with this bath, since it involves
so large a portion of the body. Such extremes are rarely useful in any
case, and should not be used except under the eye of a physician.
HALF BATH.
The half bath is much the same as the full bath. A smaller tub is
required, as the bather sits upright with his limbs extended. The water
should be at least a foot deep. During the bath, the body should be well
rubbed, and water should be poured over the upper portion of the body.
Its general effects are nearly the same as those of the full bath, and
it may be used for the same general purposes. A little more vigorous
rubbing is required to prevent chilling, as so large a portion of the
body is exposed. It affords a better opportunity for stirring up the
bowels and abdominal viscera by shaking, percussing, and kneading the
abdomen.
SHALLOW BATH.
Of this bath there are two varieties; _sitting shallow_ and _standing
shallow_.
_Sitting shallow_ differs from the half bath in employing less water,
and being much more vigorous. Its effects and uses are about the same.
The bather should rub his limbs and the front portion of his body while
the attendant pours water over his chest and shoulders, and rubs
vigorously his back and sides. A person can take the bath very well
alone by using a rather long coarse towel which can be drawn back and
forth across the back by grasping one end with each hand. It is a very
valuable means of applying water, and is in constant requisition in the
hydropathic establishments. From 85° to 90° is the proper temperature
for this bath. It may be used at a lower temperature in fever cases. At
Bellevue Hospital it is applied at about 70° in such cases, and is
administered whenever the temperature exceeds 103°. To avoid the shock
of a cool bath, it may be commenced at a temperature little below
blood-heat and then gradually cooled by the addition of cool water until
the desired temperature is reached. The reduction of the temperature
obtained by this means fully equals that obtained by the sudden
application of cold, and the shock and subsequent reaction are
prevented. This applies equally to all cool baths as well as the cool
shallow bath.
The duration of the bath may be from one to thirty minutes. Ten or
fifteen minutes will be the usual extent.
The _Standing Shallow_ is in some cases preferred by some to the
preceding. The patient stands erect in a varying depth of water—from six
inches to one or two feet being employed—while his body is vigorously
rubbed by one or two assistants, water being poured upon the chest and
shoulders at brief intervals. It is a very enlivening bath.
The shallow bath should be completed by a pail douche at a temperature
three or four degrees lower than that of the bath.
AFFUSION.
This consists simply in pouring water over the body of the patient, who
may be sitting or standing in a bath-tub. It is a very efficient bath
for reducing unnatural heat. This mode of treatment was used by
Hippocrates, Galen, and other ancient physicians. In the last century,
Currie, Jackson, and many others used it with great success in
scarlatina. It is a sovereign remedy for delirium tremens, sun-stroke,
hysteria, and sometimes of acute mania, when applied of the proper
temperature.
PAIL DOUCHE.
This bath scarcely differs from the preceding. It consists in the
dashing of one or more pailfuls of water upon the body of the bather by
an assistant. By means of a proper arrangement, the bather can
administer the bath himself. For this purpose, a pail or other vessel
filled with water may be suspended or supported above the head of the
bather in such a way that it can be quickly upset by drawing upon a
string attached to the side. The stream should fall upon the shoulders,
chest, back, or hips, but not upon the head or over the region of the
stomach. This bath may be applied after any warm bath, and should be a
little cooler than the bath which precedes it. Whether taken alone or
after another bath, it should always be followed by vigorous rubbing.
CATARACT DOUCHE.
This is a modification of the douche bath in which a broad sheet of
water is allowed to fall upon the body of the bather. The force of the
bath depends upon the height from which the water falls, and should be
regulated according to the strength of the patient. Almost any one will
bear a fall of three or four feet. When the height of the bath cannot be
easily modified, it should be of such an altitude as to be well borne by
the feeblest patients; the more vigorous can increase its effects by
subjecting themselves to it for a longer time.
The observations made relating to the application of the pail douche,
apply equally well to this bath.
HOSE DOUCHE.
In this bath, water under pressure is thrown upon the patient from a
hose, through a small nozzle. The bather turns his body while the
attendant directs the stream upon different parts. It is a less pleasant
bath than the spray or other forms of douche. Its general effects are
the same as those of the baths mentioned.
SHOWER BATH.
This bath is simply an imitation of rain. Water is allowed to fall upon
the body after being divided into a number of small streams by passing
through a vessel with a perforated bottom. Its effects depend upon the
size of the streams and the height from which they fall, together with
the temperature of the bath and its duration. Although formerly much
employed in water cure establishments, this bath is now little used,
because its place is supplied by other more convenient ones which
produce the same results, as the spray and douche. The best manner of
administering it is to commence the application with tepid water, and
gradually cool it. The temperature may range from 70° to 92°. The water
should not usually be allowed to fall upon the head, but should be
received first upon the hands and arms, then upon the feet and limbs,
and afterward upon the back and shoulders, the body being well rubbed
during the application.
The cold shower bath, formerly so common almost everywhere, has been
productive of much injury by its indiscriminate use, and has brought
much reproach upon the use of water as a curative agent. None but the
most vigorous can enjoy the bath at a lower temperature than 70°, and no
advantage is gained by its employment at a lower temperature than that,
while considerable harm may be done in many cases.
SPRAY BATH.
This bath consists in a number of fine streams of water thrown upon the
bather, with considerable force. It may be produced by connecting a hose
with spray attachment to a force-pump or reservoir from which to obtain
water under a sufficient pressure. The best form of attachment consists
of a hollow double-convex brass or copper piece, one side of which is
perforated with fine holes, the other side carrying a rim for attachment
to the hose. It is preferable to have an arrangement by which the
temperature may be readily and gradually changed from warm or tepid to
cool without interrupting the bath. In the absence of a proper spray
attachment, the apparatus elsewhere described for the hose douche may be
made to answer a very good purpose, the stream being broken by placing
the thumb or finger over the nozzle in such a way as to partially
obstruct the flow.
This is an excellent bath to follow the pack, vapor bath, hot-air bath,
sitz bath, or any other general bath which induces perspiration. It is
very agreeable to most persons, and can be applied to feeble patients
who would be unable to take any more severe form of treatment. The
alternate hot and cold spray is very successful as a means of reducing
local inflammations. The warm bath is very grateful and soothing to
swollen and rheumatic joints; in gout, also, and illy defined, wandering
pains, it is an admirable remedy. It is very successful, also, in the
treatment of tumors, abscesses, and chronic ulcers, when thoroughly
applied.
LOCAL BATHS.
The use of water as a local application is not less important, and is
much more varied, than its general application. There is no other
topical remedy which will produce such a variety of effects and such
prompt results. In removing local congestions, subduing local
inflammations, allaying circumscribed pain, and restoring activity to
inactive parts, the appropriate applications of water give results which
afford both physician and patient a degree of satisfaction which no
other single remedy can rival, even electricity, an agent of
acknowledged power, not being excepted.
SITZ BATH.
The sitz bath, also known as the hip bath, is one of the most useful
baths employed in hydropathic treatment. Its utility was fully
recognized by the earlier practitioners, who sometimes kept their
patients so long in the bath that they became almost literally
water-soaked, and were so numb from the long-continued application of
cold water as to possess almost no external sensibility. It is said that
in some cases the skin could be rubbed off in the attempts to obtain
reaction, without the patient’s knowledge.
For this bath a common tub may be used, by placing a support under one
edge to elevate it two or three inches; but it is better to use a tub
made for the purpose, which should have the back raised eight or ten
inches higher than the front, to support the back, the sides sloping
gradually so as to support the arms of the bather. The bottom should be
elevated two or three inches. The depth in front should be about the
same as that of a common wash-tub.
Enough water is required to cover the hips and extend a little way up
the abdomen; four to six gallons will suffice. Any temperature may be
employed, being suited to the condition of the patient. The duration of
the bath will also vary according to circumstances. A short cool bath is
tonic in its effects, like all short cool applications; a more prolonged
one is a powerful sedative. The hot sitz is very exciting in its effects
if long continued. The warm bath is relaxing. The hips and trunk should
be well rubbed during the bath by the patient or an attendant. The
bather should be covered with a sheet or blanket during the bath. If it
is desirable to produce sweating, several blankets may be used.
The sitz bath should seldom be taken either very hot or extremely cold.
A very good plan for administering it, and one which will be applicable
to most cases, is this: Begin the bath at 92° or 93°. If a thermometer
is not at hand, pour into the bath-tub three gallons of fresh well or
spring water, and then add one gallon of _boiling_ water. This will give
the desired temperature. After the patient has been in the bath ten
minutes, cool it down to 85°, which may be done by adding a gallon of
well water. Continue the bath five minutes longer, then administer a
pail douche or spray, at about 85°, and wipe dry, as directed after a
rubbing wet-sheet.
The sitz bath is useful for chronic congestions of the abdominal and
pelvic viscera, diarrhea, piles, dysentery, constipation, uterine
diseases, and genital and urinary disorders. In treating female diseases
it is an indispensable remedy. It is very valuable in various nervous
affections, especially those which immediately involve the brain.
There is no better remedy for a cold than a very warm sitz bath taken
while fasting, and just before retiring. It should be continued until
gentle perspiration is induced.
The sitz may be converted into a general bath by rubbing the whole body
with the wet hand while in the bath, and may thus be made to answer the
purposes of the half and shallow baths.
LEG BATH.
For this bath a vessel deep enough to receive the limbs to the middle of
the thighs is required. The bath may be taken at any desired
temperature; but it is usually employed somewhat cooler than baths which
involve the trunk of the body. It is a powerfully derivative bath, and
is found very useful to prevent wakefulness in nervous persons, and to
relieve cerebral congestion in epileptic patients. It is especially
applicable to chronic ulcers of the leg, swollen knees and ankles, and
limbs which have suffered by exposure to severe cold. It gives much
relief in gout; there is no danger of causing a metastasis of the
disease by the application of this bath.
FOOT BATH.
Any vessel sufficiently large to receive the feet, and enough water to
cover them to the ankles, is suitable for this bath. The feet should be
rubbed during the bath. If the temperature is cool, only an inch or two
of water should be employed.
The _walking foot bath_ is an excellent remedy for cold feet. It
consists in walking in shallow water five or ten minutes.
The alternate hot and cold _foot bath_ is another valuable remedy for
cold feet, and is a certain remedy for chilblains. It is given thus:
Place the feet in hot water—100° to 110°—three or four minutes. Then
withdraw them and plunge them quickly into a bath of cold water—60° or
less. After two or three minutes, restore them to the hot bath. Thus
alternate three or four times, and conclude by dipping the feet quickly
into cold water and wiping dry. This bath produces most powerful
reaction.
The foot bath is applicable in the treatment of headache, neuralgia,
toothache, catarrh, congestion of abdominal and pelvic organs, colds,
and cold feet. It is very useful as a preparatory for other baths, and
as an accompaniment of other local applications.
HALF PACK.
This bath is given in the same manner as the wet-sheet pack, except that
the wet sheet extends only from the armpits to the hips. The blankets
are wrapped about the patient in the manner described for the full pack.
All the precautions given in connection with the description of that
bath are applicable to this.
This bath is frequently employed in cases of patients who are too feeble
to bear the full pack, or as a preparatory treatment for that bath. It
is much milder than the full pack, and is usually more agreeable to the
patient, as it does not confine him so closely. It is a very useful
remedy in all inflammations of the abdominal organs, gastralgia,
pleurisy, acute bronchitis, croup, and pneumonia. When a hot application
is required, it is well to use a woolen sheet instead of a cotton one.
It requires the same after-treatment as the full pack.
CHEST PACK.
This application is made in the same manner as the half pack, allowing
the wet sheet to extend only from the armpits to the navel. It is
especially applicable to diseases of the chest. The general directions
for the full and the half pack apply to it. It is a very mild
application.
LEG PACK.
The pack may be applied to the legs with great advantage in cases of
habitual coldness of the feet and limbs or knees. The same principles
mentioned in relation to other packs apply to this. The application
should be made either cool or cold, and should extend from the hips
downward. It should continue from half an hour to an hour and a half.
CHEST WRAPPER.
This consists of a jacket made something like a vest, reaching from the
neck to a little below the navel. It should be made of double
thicknesses of soft toweling. To protect the garments or bedding from
moisture, it should be covered with another jacket made like it but a
little larger. In applying it, the wrapper should be wet in tepid water,
and should then be applied as snugly as consistent with the comfort of
the wearer. It should be re-applied every two or three hours, as it
becomes dry.
If properly managed, the chest wrapper is a valuable remedy; but it has
been greatly abused. It should not be worn more than a week without
intermission. The practice of some in continuing it until it produces an
eruption of the skin, and even longer—to promote a discharge—under the
idea that a vicarious elimination is thus performed, is highly
reprehensible, and has no sound physiological principle to support it.
Such treatment is damaging to the skin, and does the patient no good in
any way. The better plan is to allow the wrapper to be worn during the
night, but omitted during the daytime. If worn during the day, it should
be changed often, and should be removed so soon as the patient becomes
chilly. Whenever removed, the surface of the skin should be washed or
sponged with cool or tepid water. Feeble patients with defective
circulation should wear the wrapper only while walking or riding on
horseback.
This appliance may be profitably employed in a large number of chronic
diseases. In chronic bronchitis, pleurisy, pleurodynia, asthma, and the
early stages of consumption, it gives relief.
WET GIRDLE.
This was a favorite remedy with the early German hydropathists, and it
is a very useful appliance when properly employed, though it has been
much abused by excessive use, as in the case of the chest wrapper. To
apply it well, a coarse towel about three yards long is the most
convenient for use. Wet one-half of this, in tepid water, wring it until
it will not drip, and apply it to the abdomen, placing one end at the
side, and bringing it across the front first, so that two thicknesses of
the wet portion will cover the abdomen. After winding the whole tightly
around the body, fasten the end securely. The remarks made in reference
to the wearing of the chest wrapper apply with equal force to the wet
girdle. For feeble patients it is better to wet only that portion of the
towel which covers the abdomen.
This a very efficient remedy for constipation, chronic diarrhea, and
most other intestinal disorders. It is equally valuable in dyspepsia,
torpid liver, enlarged spleen, and uterine derangements.
ASCENDING DOUCHE.
This modification of the douche is simply an ascending instead of a
descending stream. It can be readily managed by constructing a reservoir
in such position as to give the water ten or twelve feet fall, when the
requisite force cannot be more easily secured. The water is conducted
through a hose, and is allowed to issue through a nozzle near the floor.
The patient sits or lies just over the nozzle, and a few inches above
it.
This is a valuable remedy in treating piles, prolapsus of the bowels or
uterus, and constipation.
DROP BATH.
In applying this bath, a vessel with a small opening in the bottom is
elevated to a considerable height, water placed in it being allowed to
drop upon the part to be treated. The aperture in the vessel should be
only sufficiently large to give egress to a single drop at a time. The
bath may also be given by placing in an elevated vessel one end of a
skein of cotton yarn, the other being allowed to fall over the edge of
the vessel and hang below it. By capillary attraction the water will be
drawn up into the yarn and will drop off at the lower end very slowly.
This is a very convenient way of applying water where its cooling
effects are required for a considerable length of time, as in wounds,
bruises, sprains, and similar cases. It will “keep down inflammation” in
a wonderful manner. It is not commonly necessary that the water should
be very cold, as evaporation will keep the part sufficiently cool in
most cases.
ARM BATH.
This is simply holding the arm in water of proper temperature. It is
extremely useful in such painful affections as felons, sprains, and
nearly all injuries of the hand and arm. Ulcers and acute and chronic
skin diseases of the hands and arm are usually benefited by this bath.
If cold water is painful, its application should be preceded by that of
hot water, or alternated with it. Cold hands should be frequently rubbed
in cool water, and alternately immersed for a few minutes each in hot
and cold water. In case of painful felons, the arm must be immersed to
the elbow to relieve the pain, although the disease is only in the
finger.
HEAD BATH.
The patient should lie upon his back, resting his head in a shallow
basin of cool water. The attendant should bathe the forehead, face, and
temples during the bath. The bath may be continued until the heat is
removed or lessened.
The pouring head bath is often preferable to the preceding. The patient
should lie upon a bed or sofa, face downward, allowing his head to
extend outward over a tub or other wide vessel, while the water is
poured upon the head from a little height, by an assistant. The water
may be either hot or cold, according to existing conditions. Very cold
water is not usually advisable, as its application soon becomes painful,
and produces powerful reaction. It should be tepid or temperate. Some
cases require very hot water for a few minutes, followed by a slight
affusion of tepid water.
In hysteria, epilepsy, apoplexy, sun-stroke, acute mania, delirium
tremens, and cerebral congestion from any cause, the head bath is a
promptly efficacious remedy.
EYE BATH.
Water may be applied to the eye in various ways. A convenient method
when only a brief application is necessary, is to lave the eye with
water dipped by the hand. A gentle spray may be applied, or the eyes may
be opened and closed in water, thus bringing them freely in contact with
the element. Small glass cups made for the purpose may be filled with
water and placed over the eye, the water being frequently changed; or
wet cloths may be laid upon them.
In applying water to the eye, it is important to be able to first
distinguish the exact nature of the difficulty, as much damage may
otherwise be done by a wrong application. As a general rule,
inflammations of the conjunctiva and _external_ structures of the eye
require _cool_ or _cold_ applications, while inflammations of the
cornea, iris, and other _internal_ structures, require _hot_
applications. This rule is often violated in hydropathic establishments
through ignorance of the structure and diseases of the eye.
Cool applications are best made by laying upon the eyes thin folds of
linen cloth wet in cold water. Not more than two or three thicknesses
should be used, as a thick compress soon becomes warm, while a thin one
is kept cool for a longer time by evaporation. The compress should be
changed every five minutes, at least, when there is much inflammation.
The fomentation is as good as any method of applying hot water to the
eyes. The application, when hot, should be as hot as the patient can
well bear. If it affords relief, continue half an hour or more; if it
increases the pain, desist at once. The same may be said of cold
applications also.
Alternate hot and cold applications will give most relief in some cases.
After a hot application, a slightly cooler one should always be applied
for a few minutes.
A little milk, quince-seed mucilage, or other bland substance, added to
the water, makes it more agreeable to the eye in bathing it.
The eye bath is applicable in all inflammations and injuries of the eye,
and is infinitely superior to all other eye washes.
Daily bathing the eyes in tepid water is a good practice for those who
use them much in reading, writing, or other work requiring close
attention. Many eyes are ruined by neglect and maltreatment.
EAR BATH.
Water applications are made to the ear by means of fomentations,
compresses, the douche, or the spray. Compresses and fomentations are
useful in inflammations of the structures of the ear, including
abscesses which often form in the walls of the external canal. Alternate
hot and cold applications are useful in causing the absorption of
inflammatory deposits, and thus restoring the hearing. The douche,
administered with the fountain syringe, is a valuable means of removing
foreign bodies and insects. The warm douche has proved very serviceable
in restoring the hearing by removing hardened ear-wax. In administering
the douche, the head should be inclined over a basin, while the stream
of water is allowed to issue from the nozzle held close to the external
opening of the ear. Violent syringing of the ear should never be
practiced, as it may occasion irreparable injury.
NOSE BATH.
This bath is administered either by drawing water into the nose while
the mouth is closed, or by injecting it by means of a fountain syringe.
Great care should always be exercised to apply the water gently, as a
forcible application will cause pain and irritation. Injection should
never be practiced with a piston syringe, as there is liability of
forcing the water into the Eustachian canals and producing deafness. The
temperature of the water should be warm or tepid for most applications.
Much benefit may be derived by the proper use of this bath in case of
acute or chronic catarrh. The addition of a slight portion of salt to
the water does no harm, and a slightly saline fluid is sometimes less
unpleasant than pure water, probably because it is more nearly like the
mucous secretion of the nasal mucous membrane. Drawing cold water into
the nose is sometimes recommended for hemorrhage from the nose; but it
is of doubtful utility, because the application cannot be continuous,
and transient applications of cold water are always followed by an
afflux of blood to the part so exposed. There are better remedies for
nose-bleed.
COMPRESSES.
The compress is a wet cloth or bandage applied to a part. The object may
be to cool the part under treatment, or to retain heat. The compress may
be used with equal success for either purpose. When the part is to be
cooled, a compress composed of several folds should be wet in cool,
cold, or iced water, as required, and placed upon the part after being
wrung so it will not drip. It should be changed as often as _every five
minutes_. This is often neglected to the injury of the patient. A very
cold compress may be prepared by placing snow or pounded ice between the
folds of the compress. This will not need renewal so frequently; but its
effects must be carefully watched, as injury may be done by neglect. In
applying cold to such delicate parts as the eye, a very thin compress is
better. It should be renewed once in five minutes, at least.
When accumulated warmth is required, a thick compress is applied, being
wrung out of tepid water, and covered with a dry cloth to exclude the
air. Soft, dry flannel is an excellent covering. Rubber or oiled silk
may be employed when the compress is not to be retained more than a few
hours; but if it is to be worn continuously, they will be injurious, as
they are impervious to air and thus interfere with the function of the
skin. The effects of a compress thus applied are identical with those of
the poultice, and the application is a much more cleanly one.
Compresses are applicable in all cases in which poultices are commonly
used. They may replace the old-fashioned plasters with profit and
comfort to the wearer. The wet-sheet pack, half pack chest pack and
wrapper, leg pack, and wet girdle are all large compresses.
When applied continuously in the same place for a long time, the
compress occasions a considerable eruption of the skin, and sometimes
boils and carbuncles. There is no particular advantage in these
eruptions, and they sometimes do much harm by producing a great degree
of general irritation. The notion that they purify the system, though a
very popular one, has really a very slight foundation. The discharge is
largely made up of elements which would be of great utility if retained
in the system, and the amount of foul matter eliminated in this way is
certainly infinitesimal compared with the amount thrown off by a few
inches of healthy skin. The skin can always do more and better work when
healthy than when diseased. The eruptions are no doubt due to debility
of the skin, produced by a too long continuance of the very abnormal
conditions supplied by the compress. Yet, strange as it may appear,
there are those claiming to be physicians who directly aim to produce
inflamed and irritated surfaces by the continuation of the compress for
months and even years.
The _wet head cap_ is a compress made to fit the head. It should consist
of several thicknesses of cotton or linen cloth, so as to retain
moisture for some time. It is a good temporary appliance in diseases of
the scalp, and for headache; but it should never be worn continuously
for the purpose of relieving congestion, as it will have an effect just
the opposite of that desired. In eczema of the scalp it may be worn
until the disease is cured, being frequently rewetted. It is an
excellent means of preventing sun-stroke and other effects of heat when
worn beneath the hat in summer; but even for this purpose its use should
be temporary, the cap being worn only during the hotter portion of the
day.
FOMENTATIONS.
The fomentation is a local application analogous to such general
appliances as the hot pack, vapor bath, and hot-air bath. It consists in
the application of a cloth wet in hot water. It may be considered as a
hot compress. Fold a soft _flannel_ cloth twice, so that it will be of
three or four thicknesses. Lay it in a basin, pour boiling water upon
it, and wring it dry by folding it in a dry towel. Or, if only one end
of the cloth is wet, it may be wrung by folding the dry portion outside
of the wet; in wringing, the whole will become equally wet. Apply it to
the patient as hot as it can be borne. The second application can
usually be made much hotter than the first. Frequently dipping the hands
in cold water will enable the attendant to wring the cloth much hotter
than he would otherwise be able to do. The most convenient way is to
heat the cloths in a steamer; by this means they are made as hot as
boiling water, and yet they are more easily handled, not being saturated
with water. When no hot water is at hand, a fomentation may, in an
emergency, be quickly prepared by wetting the flannel in cool water,
wringing it as dry as desired, folding it between the leaves of a
newspaper, and laying it upon the top of the stove, or holding it
smoothly against the side. The paper prevents the cloth from becoming
soiled, the water protects the paper from burning, and the steam
generated quickly heats the cloth to boiling heat. For a long
fomentation, the heat may be made continuous by applying over the wet
cloth a hot brick or slab of soapstone.
The hot cloths should be re-applied once in five minutes. Two cloths
should be employed, so that the second may be applied the moment the
first is removed. To retain the heat, a dry flannel, rubber, or oilcloth
should be placed over the fomentation. The application may be continued
from ten minutes to half an hour, or longer in special cases. This
appliance is very powerful, and should not be employed to excess.
Alternate hot and cold fomentations are frequently more efficient than
the continuous fomentation. Hot applications should always be followed
by a cool or tepid compress for four or five minutes, at least.
The uses of the fomentation are very numerous. It is indicated whenever
there is local pain without excessive heat, or evidences of acute
inflammation. Local congestions, neuralgia, toothache, pleurisy,
pleurodynia, and most local pains vanish beneath its potent influence as
if by magic. For indigestion, colic, constipation, torpid liver,
dysmenorrhea, and rheumatic pains, it is a remedy of great power, and is
used with almost uniform success. In relieving sick headache by
application to the head, neck, and stomach, its efficiency is unrivaled.
When applied to the head for some time without intermission, it will
often occasion faintness; hence, a cooler application should be made
after the use of the hot cloths for fifteen or twenty minutes.
If the applications must be continued for a long time, it is well in
most cases to apply them at a temperature slightly lower than when they
are to be used for only a few minutes.
This remedy may well replace the blisters, plasters, cataplasms,
scarifications, rubefacients, and other irritating measures so long used
for relieving pain, local congestions, and inflammations.
REFRIGERANT APPLICATIONS.
A freezing mixture which will reduce the temperature to 4° is made by
mixing equal parts of salt and pounded ice. The ice and salt should be
stirred together very quickly and applied at once to the part to be
frozen. Two parts of dry snow and one of salt make an equally good
mixture. Freezing is more conveniently performed by the rapid
evaporation of ether or rhigoline.
Freezing is a useful process in numerous cases. By its use,
excrescences—as warts, wens, and polypi—fibrous tumors, and even
malignant tumors, as cancer, may be successfully removed. Small cancers
may sometimes be cured by repeated and long-continued freezing. Their
growth may certainly be impeded by this means. Felons, if treated early
in their course, may be cured by two or three freezings.
For freezing a felon, place the finger in a mixture ice and salt, or
surround it with cotton, saturate the cotton with ether or rhigoline,
and blow it very strongly with a pair of bellows. This is a very good
method when an apparatus for producing a fine spray is not at hand. The
latter instrument facilitates the freezing very much if used with the
bellows.
No harm results from repeated freezing if proper care is used in thawing
the frozen parts. They should be kept immersed in cool water, or covered
with cloths kept cool by frequent wetting with cold water, until the
natural feeling is restored.
The application of ice is found extremely serviceable in many
inflammatory diseases, and in some nervous affections. In inflammation
of the brain, the ice cap is of inestimable value. Ice applied to the
spine will check the convulsive spasms of chorea and hysteria when other
remedies fail. In putrid sore throat, or malignant diphtheria, ice is a
sovereign remedy. It should be applied to the neck externally, and held
in small bits in the mouth. Small bits swallowed will sometimes relieve
the pains of gastralgia.
Rubber bags are very convenient for applying ice or iced water; but
their place can be very well supplied by dried bladders filled with
pounded ice. The ice cap is a double head cap stuffed with pounded ice.
Some physicians recommend the application of ice to the spine in cases
of congestive chill and paralysis, and in inflammation of the stomach,
kidneys, uterus, and other internal organs. The real worth of such
applications in these cases has yet to be determined by careful and
repeated observations. We would not recommend an unskillful person to
attempt to relieve a violent ague chill by rubbing ice on the patient’s
back, and we have some fears that a very skillful operator would hardly
succeed to his entire satisfaction and that of the patient.
The snow bath, applied by rubbing the part vigorously with snow, is a
useful application for restoring the circulation to frosted parts. In
cases of extreme chilling or absolute freezing, there is perhaps no
better remedy. Powdered ice may be used when snow cannot be readily
procured.
MISCELLANEOUS BATHS, ETC.
VAPOR BATH.
This bath can be readily and successfully administered with such
conveniences as every family possess. Place the patient in a cane-seat
chair, having first taken the precaution to spread over the seat a dry
towel. Surround the patient and the chair first with a woolen blanket,
and then with two or three thick comfortables, drawing the blankets
close around his neck, and allowing them to trail upon the floor so as
to exclude the air as perfectly as possible. Now place under the chair a
large pan or pail containing two or three quarts of boiling water. Let
the blankets fall quickly so as to retain the rising vapor. After a
minute or two, raise the blankets a little at one side and carefully
place in the vessel a very hot brick or stone, dropping the blankets
again as soon as possible avoid the admission of cold air. Before the
first brick or stone has cooled, add another, and so continue until the
patient perspires freely. The amount of perspiration must be judged by
the face and forehead, as much of the moisture on the skin beneath the
blankets is condensed steam. Should the bath become at any time too hot,
a little air may be admitted by raising the bottom of the blankets a
little, being careful to avoid chilling the patient in so doing. The
bath should seldom be continued more than half an hour, and fifteen to
twenty minutes will usually accomplish all that is desired by the bath.
If too long continued, it induces faintness. A too high temperature will
be indicated by a strongly accelerated pulse, throbbing of the temples,
flushed face, and headache. The head should be kept cool by a compress
wet in cool water and often changed. The temperature of the bath should
be from 100° to 115°. Unpleasant effects are sometimes produced at 120°.
After this bath, apply the tepid spray, rubbing wet-sheet, pail douche,
or full bath. No time should be allowed to elapse after the blankets are
removed before the concluding bath is applied, as the patient will
chill. He should not be allowed to become chilly by exposure to cool air
before the application of the spray, douche, or other bath, which should
be followed by vigorous rubbing.
For “breaking up a cold,” relieving rheumatism, soreness of the muscles
from overexertion, and relaxing stiffened joints, this is a valuable
agent. It may also be used to advantage in chronic diseases in which
there is torpidity of the skin; but great care must be exercised to
avoid excessive use, as too frequent repetitions of the bath produce
debility.
This is a milder application than the hot-air bath, unless employed at a
high temperature, 120° or more, when it becomes more severe.
In institutions where the bath is in daily requisition, a permanent
arrangement for giving the bath is usually employed. It sometimes
consists of a box in which the patient sits upon a stool, his head being
allowed to remain outside by a suitable opening. A wet towel is placed
around the neck to prevent the steam from rising about the head. Others
prefer a box or small room large enough to admit the whole person, the
whole body being subjected to the warm vapor. An opening guarded by a
curtain is made in one side to allow the bather to inhale cool air if he
should wish to do so, and to give the attendant access to the patient
without chilling him by the admission of a large quantity of cold air.
As in the simpler form of vapor bath, the head should be kept constantly
cool by a cool wet compress often re-applied. Patients troubled with
“rush of blood to the head,” should be further protected by a large cool
compress placed around the neck and the upper part of the chest.
Steam may be generated for these larger baths by boiling water in the
box with a spirit-lamp or a gas-burner, or it may be conducted into the
box by a rubber tube connected with a tight boiler.
RUSSIAN BATH.
This is essentially the same in effect as the vapor bath. It consists of
a room filled with vapor, and so arranged that by transferring the
patient from one point to another the heat may be gradually increased.
It has no advantages not afforded by the simpler vapor bath. It is now
much used in the larger cities. Probably as much harm as good results
from the indiscriminate and reckless manner in which it is employed.
Patients have been known to die in the bath of apoplexy induced by the
excessive heat. It is followed by shampooing and cooling baths of
various sorts.
HOT-AIR BATH.
In administering this bath, prepare the patient precisely as directed
for the vapor bath. Instead of placing under the chair a vessel of hot
water, place a large alcohol lamp or a small dish containing a few
ounces of alcohol. When all is ready, light the lamp or alcohol, and
carefully exclude the air. It is hardly necessary to suggest the
propriety of putting the lamp in such a position as to insure safety
from fire. If alcohol is used in an open dish, it is important to wipe
the outside of the vessel quite free from any trace of the fluid, as
otherwise it might be communicated to the floor or carpet. Also avoid
spilling any portion in putting it in place, for the same reason. It is
a very good precaution to place the dish containing the burning alcohol
in a plate or shallow vessel containing a little water.
This bath should be conducted in the same manner as the vapor bath. A
temperature of 140° to 160° is not at all disagreeable to the patient.
At 170° or 180° the same effects are produced as in the vapor bath at
120°. The bath should be followed by cooling baths as directed for the
vapor bath.
This is a very valuable remedy for the same class of diseases for which
the vapor bath is recommended. It is of very great service in cases of
dropsy, Bright’s disease with poisoning from retained urea, and all
cases in which a vigorous elimination by the skin is desired. It should
not be continued longer than the vapor bath, and much harm may result
from its too frequent employment. Like the vapor bath, this may be
conducted in a suitable box with an opening for the head.
TURKISH BATH.
This is entirely analogous to the hot-air bath, though on a much more
elaborate plan. The patient is gradually conducted from a temperature of
120° to that of 160° or even much more than 200°. The bath is concluded
by shampooing, rubbing, cooling baths, and gradual cooling in a room
maintained at a temperature of 70°.
The uses of this bath are the same as those of the hot-air bath. It has
no advantages over it of very great importance, and is much more liable
to produce injury by prolonged and frequent application. It generally
occupies an hour, and by those who resort to it as a luxury, as did the
ancient Romans, it is often prolonged to several hours.
The long-continued application of excessive heat to the body is a very
unnatural process. It tends to produce permanent relaxation and debility
of the cutaneous tissues, and the manner in which this bath is
administered in Turkish bath establishments is productive of great harm.
It is often presented to invalids as almost a panacea; and is given
alike to the strong and vigorous, and the weak and debilitated.
The bath is certainly good in its place, but it is decidedly bad when
abused. Many consider the hot-air bath greatly preferable since it
obviates the necessity of inhaling superheated air, the effects of which
upon the lungs are said to be injurious. The hot-air bath is doubtless
safer.
ELECTRIC BATH.
Electricity may be more efficiently applied in connection with water
than by itself. Water is a better conductor of electricity than the dry
skin, and hence facilitates its communication to the body. The ordinary
method of applying electricity is by attaching one pole of the battery
to a metallic plate, placed in contact with some part of the body, while
the circuit is completed by the application to the patient of a moist
sponge connected with the other pole. The operator often holds one pole
in his hand and applies the other hand, moistened, to the part to be
treated. He is in this way enabled to judge very accurately of the
strength of the current applied. The metallic plate is frequently placed
at the feet of the patient, sometimes in a foot bath. The sponge may be
applied to various parts of the body while the patient is in a sitz
bath. For a general application of electricity the full bath is most
convenient.
This bath is applicable to a very large variety of conditions. To
describe them all would be to give nearly all the uses of electricity as
a remedial agent, which does not come within the scope of this work. The
electric full bath has been strongly recommended for the removal of
mineral poisons from the body. Just how efficacious it is in this
respect, we cannot confidently affirm. Probably its value has been
somewhat exaggerated. Only the primary or galvanic current could be of
any service in this direction.
Electricity is generally acknowledged to be a powerful remedial agent;
but its use requires costly apparatus and much skill in application. It
is necessary that the operator should not only understand the nature of
diseases and the proper methods of applying electricity in treating
them, but he must also thoroughly understand the general laws of
electricity. The electric bath is as badly abused by quacks and
charlatans as the Turkish bath. It should not be employed by unskillful
persons; and for this and other reasons given, it is not well adapted to
home use.
ELECTRO-VAPOR BATH.
This is a combination of the electric and the vapor bath, the
electricity being applied to the body by means of the sponge, and
metallic plates covered with moistened cloths. It is a valuable
appliance if carefully used; but, like all effective modes of treatment,
it is very liable to excessive use, which becomes abuse. It has been
very highly lauded by certain specialists, and doubtless its value has
been unstintedly exaggerated. It is perhaps not well proven that its
effects are greatly superior to the effects of the vapor bath and
electric bath administered separately; and the latter mode would be more
convenient, though consuming a little more time.
DRY RUBBING-SHEET.
Cover the patient with a soft, dry sheet in the same manner as directed
for applying the wet sheet in the rubbing wet-sheet bath. Then rub
lightly but briskly upon the outside of the sheet with the flat hand. Do
not rub _with_ the sheet, but over it. Continue the rubbing ten or
fifteen minutes, going over the whole body several times, and not
neglecting the arms, the hands, and the feet. This application may be
administered daily with profit to nearly all patients. It should always
follow any form of general bath in which water is employed, as a means
of drying the body. It promotes activity of the skin, and equalizes the
circulation.
DRY HAND-RUBBING.
This application is much the same in effect as the preceding, though a
little more soothing, and hence better adapted to nervous patients. It
consists in rubbing the body gently with the palm of the dry hand. The
force of the rubbing should be nicely graduated to the condition of the
patient. When employed to excite considerable activity of the skin, the
rubbing may be accompanied with kneading of the abdomen, and light
percussion of the surface.
Gentle rubbing of the skin is a very soothing process. It will
frequently induce sleep when other means are ineffectual. Rubbing the
back and limbs downward, and gentle rubbing of the temples, are very
soothing to children and nervous invalids.
AIR BATH.
The air has a very soothing effect upon the body when allowed to come in
contact with the entire surface. It answers a very valuable purpose when
a water bath is impossible, or when the patient is too feeble to endure
the application of water. A sleepless person will often fall into a
sound and refreshing slumber after walking a few minutes in his room
with the whole body exposed to the air. The effects of night labor upon
literary people may be partially counteracted by the air bath. Benjamin
Franklin was accustomed to pursue his writing to a late hour after
divesting himself of his clothing, and he recommends the practice to
others compelled to labor late with the pen.
SUN BATH.
The value of sunlight as a hygienic agent is so universally
recognized—theoretically if not practically—that we need not devote
space to its consideration in this connection. Sunlight is essential to
the healthy performance of the vital functions, and must be equally
important as an aid to remedial processes. This fact has been amply
demonstrated by hospital experience, which shows a much larger
percentage of recoveries in rooms abundantly exposed to the sun than in
those secluded from its rays.
That the sun has a powerful influence upon the skin is shown by the
great increase of pigment in that structure when freely exposed to the
sunlight. This results from an increased activity of the cutaneous
tissues.
Experience has shown that the sun bath can be employed to advantage in
most chronic diseases. The patient simply lies in a position in which
the naked skin can be freely exposed to the rays of the sun. The head
should be shaded. The bath should not be continued so long as to produce
unpleasant effects either upon the skin or the general system. It may be
accompanied and followed with the dry hand-rubbing.
SEA-BATHING.
Bathing in the sea is much practiced by fashionable people who make
annual visits to the sea-coast for this purpose. It is no doubt useful,
though many who participate in it would doubtless receive quite as much
benefit if they took as many baths at home during the whole year as they
take at the fashionable watering-places in a single week. It is a fine
thing to be well washed once a year, however, if not more often.
As generally conducted, sea-bathing is not more beneficial than harmful.
The dissipation accompanying it more than counterbalances what good
might be gained. It is rather absurd to attribute any specific virtues
to sea-water, as many do. Quite a large business is carried on in the
evaporation of sea-water and the sale of the dirty residue, which is
again dissolved in water and used in bathing by those who live too far
inland to enjoy the benefits of bathing in the sea, or who prefer to
take their sea-bath in their own private bath-room. Everything must have
a counterfeit, and so this seasalt is imitated by base swindlers who
prepare a mixture of chemicals just as powerful, but not quite so
complicated, and less dirty, though certainly equally good. All of this
trouble and swindling might be saved if people would only consider for a
moment the fact that all the benefit they obtain from bathing is derived
from the exercise, the temperature, and pure water, and not from any
impurities which the water may chance to contain.
Sea-bathing is usually overdone. More benefit will be gained by one or
two daily baths than by a half-dozen. Fifty baths in a single week are
not equivalent to a single bath each in fifty weeks.
MEDICATED BATHS.
We have no faith in medicated baths in general. They are occasionally
useful for the destruction of vermin, animal parasites, and perhaps in
certain cases of skin disease. Generally, it is far better to take the
limpid element “Simon pure,” unadulterated. Many medicated baths have
acquired great celebrity by the performance of cures really wonderful,
but wholly attributable to water only, in spite of, rather than in
conjunction with, the foreign medicament added.
OIL BATH.
Inunction was greatly practiced by the ancients in connection with the
Roman and Turkish baths. It consists in rubbing the skin very thoroughly
with some unctuous substance. Olive oil may be employed, but cosmoline
or vaseline, two refined products of coal oil, are in some respects
preferable. Olive oil cannot be obtained pure, except at almost fabulous
prices. That sold in the drug stores as olive oil is really cotton-seed
oil and mixtures of lard with various other vegetable oils.
A warm bath should first be administered. Then dry the patient, as
usual, and apply the unguent, taking care to rub it in thoroughly.
Simply greasing the surface is not the object sought. The skin and flesh
should be worked, rubbed, and kneaded until the oil nearly disappears
from the surface.
The object of this application is to supply the place of defective
natural secretion of oleaginous material, to increase the activity of
the skin, and to diminish susceptibility to cold. How this is
accomplished, readily appears. The oil is a simple substitute for the
sebaceous secretion, which is, in a certain class of diseases, notably
deficient. The thorough manipulation of the skin which is necessary in
applying the oil, and which is facilitated by a lubricant, directly
promotes cutaneous activity. Whether the oil itself has any direct
effect in increasing the functional activity of the skin cannot be
positively affirmed, although it is reasonably supposable that the skin
will act more nearly normal when a deficient element is supplied than
when it is wanting. Oil is an excellent non-conductor; and invalids who
are especially susceptible to cold may be rendered comfortable by the
application of the oil bath.
The class of cases to which this remedy is applicable will be
sufficiently well indicated by the purposes which the bath is supposed
to subserve. It should not be used indiscriminately. Once or twice a
week is sufficiently often to make the application, and each should be
followed by a warm bath with fine soap, two or three days after.
NOVEL BATHS.
Numerous substances have been employed in bathing, under the idea that
they possessed peculiar specific virtues; the following are some of the
chief:—
_Mud Bath._—Immersion of the body in warm mud has been a favorite
practice at several places in Italy, France, Germany, and other
countries. The effects are not very different from those of any warm
bath, and are said to be very pleasant, by those who have taken them. If
the mud were not medicated, this kind of bath would not be especially
objectionable for those who could enjoy it.
_Earth Bath._—Burying the body in the moist earth has also been
practiced. We have known of one instance in which this remedy was
successfully used in the treatment of ague.
_Bees’ eggs_, _milk_, _blood_, _wine_, _sand_, and _gelatine_ have also
been employed by different nations, at different periods, in bathing.
None of these applications are superior to pure water, which all nature
recognizes as the proper material for bathing purposes.
ENEMA.
Fecal accumulations in the lower bowel are more quickly and easily
removed by an enema of warm water than by any purgative, laxative, or
cathartic ever discovered or invented; and the use of this remedy is
never accompanied by the unpleasant and painful griping and tenesmus
which often accompany the use of cathartics. The administration is a
trifle more troublesome, but the results are enough superior to more
than repay the inconvenience. The fountain syringe is far preferable to
any other for administering injections. Water about blood-warm should be
used when the purpose is to relieve constipation, and a considerable
quantity—one to three pints, or more—may be used. The water should be
retained for a few minutes, while the bowels are kneaded and shaken. In
hemorrhage and inflammation of the lower bowel, cool or cold clysters
should be employed, and should be retained as long as possible. The
copious cool enema is a valuable antiphlogistic remedy used in
conjunction with the cool bath in cases of violent febrile excitement,
as typhoid fever, when the temperature rises above 103° F.
The enema is a most perfect substitute for purgatives in general. Cases
are very rare in which a cathartic drug will be found necessary if the
enema is properly used. But the enema may become a source of mischief if
abused. If habitually relied upon to secure a movement of the bowels for
a long time, the bowels lose their activity, and the most obstinate
constipation sometimes results, precisely as from the prolonged use of
purgatives.
WATER EMETIC.
Warm water at about 92°—not hot water—is a most excellent emetic if
taken in sufficient quantity. It is prompt in action, and is
unaccompanied by the painful nausea, retching, and straining produced by
most other emetics. From half a pint to one or two quarts is required to
produce emesis. The patient should slowly swallow a tumblerful, then
rest two or three minutes, and swallow another, so continuing to drink
for ten minutes or more. As soon as the slightest disposition to vomit
is felt—or even if it is not felt, after a considerable quantity of
water has been taken—the patient should touch the back part of his mouth
with the end of his finger or a feather, as far down as he can reach.
This will usually excite the desired action. If it does not, all that
need be done is to continue drinking. A little salt added to the water
will make it more sickening, and will do no particular harm, as it is
thrown out again.
It is not claimed that the warm-water emetic can replace all other
emetics in _all cases_. When instant vomiting is necessary, as in cases
of poisoning, some more prompt emetic may be used with it. But for all
ordinary purposes, it clearly has no rival.
DRY HOT APPLICATIONS.
The use of fomentations is often less convenient or desirable than dry
applications of heat, which may be made in a variety of ways. Bottles,
jugs, or rubber bags, filled with hot water, hot bricks or stones,
wrapped in papers or cloths, hot cloths, bags filled with hot sand,
salt, or corn meal, are all convenient methods of applying dry heat.
A few suggestions with reference to the manner of using hot applications
may be useful. In applying heat to the feet when the circulation in
those organs is defective, it is frequently insufficient to apply the
heat to the bottoms of the feet, only. For this reason, jugs or bottles
and stones are often applied without effecting any satisfactory results.
A much more efficient method is the following: Heat to a suitable
temperature two or three pounds of corn meal or salt. Place the salt or
meal in a bag sufficiently large to envelop the feet. After distributing
it evenly through the bag, wrap the latter about the feet and cover them
with a woolen blanket. A rubber bag partially filled with hot water is
an excellent appliance for use in cases of neuralgia, toothache, and
nearly all acute pains in the region of the head, as it will conform so
perfectly to the shape of the part to which it is applied, and may be
used as a pillow.
As a general rule, hot applications should not be continued more than an
hour or two, at longest, without, at least, a transient application of a
lower temperature. Too prolonged an application may result in injury to
the part.
WATER-DRINKING.
As a remedial agent, water is of far greater value than any other liquid
taken into the stomach. Its uses in preserving health have been
previously noticed. Under ordinary circumstances, a person in health who
discards irritating condiments from his diet seldom requires drink. Many
persons take no drink whatever during the winter months. But drinking is
healthful, and pure water of proper temperature may be taken by any one
in health or disease if it is taken in the proper manner. Drinking at
meals is an unwholesome practice. Drinking large quantities of iced
water is unhealthful. Cold water should not be taken freely when the
drinker is hot or exhausted. The thirst will be quenched as readily by
slowly sipping a small quantity. In fevers, water should be freely
allowed. A glass of cool water taken half an hour before breakfast is an
excellent remedy for habitual constipation.
Water-drinking may be made a means of bathing the internal structures,
as external applications bathe the outside. Water is rapidly absorbed by
the mucous membrane of the stomach, and, passing through the
circulation, it dissolves many impurities, and is eliminated chiefly by
the kidneys and skin. It can be used with benefit in connection with the
vapor bath, hot-air bath, and all baths in which sweating is induced. It
should not be used in such great excess as it was employed by the early
hydropathists, however, whose patients drank from ten to thirty glasses
of water a day.
Free drinking of water is useful in cases in which the urine is scanty
and irritating. It gives relief by diluting the urinary excretions.
HOW TO MAKE A FILTER.
For drinking, and for all ordinary purposes, it is of the greatest
importance that water should be as pure as possible. When water which is
nearly soft, and wholly free from organic impurities, cannot be obtained
from wells or springs, filtered rain water should be employed. A very
useful filter can be easily and cheaply constructed in the following
manner:—
Make a hole low down in the side, or in the bottom, of a large earthen
jar or flower-pot. Place in the bottom of the vessel a few clean stones
about the size of eggs. Fill the jar to within two or three inches of
the top with equal parts of fine, clean gravel and pulverized charcoal.
Cover the jar with a clean, white cloth, securing the edges by a string
drawn about the top. The center of the cloth cover should be allowed to
hang down into the vessel so as to form a hollow into which the water
may be poured, the cloth serving as a strainer to remove the coarser
dirt. The cloth should be frequently cleansed, and the gravel and
charcoal should be renewed at least once a year.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
HEALTH PUBLICATIONS.
The Hygienic Family Physician.
A manual well adapted to family use. It describes in simple language all
common diseases, and gives careful directions for treating them without
the use of drugs. It also contains invaluable instruction respecting the
care of the health. Bound in cloth, $1.00.
The Uses of Water in Health and Disease.
This work comprises a sketch of the history of bathing, an explanation
of the properties and effects of water, a description of all the
different kinds of baths, and directions for applying water as a remedy
for disease. Water is not presented as a “cure-all,” but as a valuable
adjunct of other remedies, and in some cases the most useful of all
curative agents. This work will prove a valuable guide to those who wish
to employ water in treating disease. Pamphlet edition, 136 pp., 25
cents. A fine edition in cloth, 160 pp., 60 cents.
Health and Diseases of Woman.
A treatise on the nature and cause of the diseases of women; a work
which every woman—especially mothers—ought to possess. Lifelong misery
will be avoided by regarding its advice. 15 cents.
The Hygienic System.
An explanation of the principles of a system of treating disease which
dispenses with drugs and poisons. It is radical, terse, and
uncompromising, and gives the advocates of druggery no quarter. 15
cents.
Healthful Cookery.
A Hand-Book of Food and Diet; or, What to Eat, When to Eat, and How to
Eat. It contains a large number of recipes for the preparation of
wholesome and palatable food without condiments. Almost any dyspeptic
can cure himself by making it his rule of diet; and any one who
carefully follows its teachings will be proof against indigestion. 128
pp., 25 cents.
An Essay on Tobacco-Using.
This little work explains the effects of tobacco on the human system,
together with those of all other poisons. It finds no apology for the
use of tobacco, and faithfully depicts its evils. 15 cents.
The Evils of Fashionable Dress, and How to Dress Healthfully.
A criticism of the fashionable modes of ladies’ dress, pointing out the
numerous evils arising therefrom, and the proper remedy. The subject is
treated candidly, and the writer admits the possibility of a commendable
reform in dress which will not expose the wearer to ridicule on account
of its peculiarities. Every lady ought to read it and profit by its
suggestions. 10 cents.
☞Continued on next page.
Alcoholic Poison:
_The Physical, Moral, and Social Effects of Alcohol as a Beverage and as
a Medicine._
This work defines true temperance, explains the nature of alcohol and
the manner of its production, describes its physical effects upon the
human body, exhibits by statistics its moral and social effects, points
out the causes and proper cure of the evil of intemperance, answers the
drunkard’s arguments in favor of drinking, exposes the fallacies of
alcoholic medication, and defends the Bible against the imputation that
it advocates or favors the use of alcoholic drinks. Temperance workers
will find this a useful auxiliary. 128 pp. 20 cents.
Proper Diet for Man.
A concise summary of the evidences upon which the practice of
vegetarianism is based. It contains the pith of larger works on the same
subject, with some additional arguments. 15 cents.
Health and Temperance Tracts.
_A Package of 15 Tracts, aggregating nearly 250 pp. 30 cents._
=Dyspepsia.=—An account of its causes, how to prevent it, and how to
cure it.
=Healthful Clothing.=—A description of the evils of fashionable dress,
and directions for clothing the body healthfully.
=Principles of Health Reform.=—An introduction to the subject.
=Startling Facts about Tobacco.=—A vivid portrayal of the evils arising
from the use of the filthy weed.
=Twenty-five Arguments for Tobacco-Using Briefly Answered.=—A tract for
every smoker, chewer, and snuffer of tobacco.
=True Temperance.=—A definition of temperance and the true temperance
platform.
=Tea and Coffee.=—Why their use is unhealthful.
=Pork.=—The dangers of pork-eating exposed. Startling facts.
=Alcohol: What Is It?=—A description of the chemical and physical
properties of alcohol, and the mode of its production.
=Alcoholic Poison.=—A personal appeal to young drunkards.
=Moral and Social Effects of Alcohol.=—A collection of astonishing facts
and statistics.
=Causes and Cure of Intemperance.=—The gigantic evil traced to its true
source, and the only efficient remedy pointed out.
=The Drunkard’s Arguments Answered.=—A complete refutation of the
arguments in favor of rum.
=Alcoholic Medication.=—An exposure of the evils of the medical use of
alcohol, and its uselessness.
=Wine and the Bible.=—A defense of the Bible against the oft-repeated
charge that it favors the use of fermented drinks.
_These tracts are furnished at the rate of 800 pages for one dollar. A
liberal discount by the quantity._
Address, =_HEALTH REFORMER, Battle Creek, Mich._=
_Dress Reform Patterns._
The following patterns are finely adapted to meeting the requirements of
healthful clothing. No woman should be without them. They can be adapted
to children as well as adults.
=_No. 1._= A flannel undergarment to be worn next to the skin. It covers
the whole body from neck to wrists and ankles. Price, 50 cts.
=_No. 2._= A garment combining chemise and drawers, arranged with
buttons so as to support the skirts and stockings from the shoulders. To
be worn next to the preceding garment in cold weather. Price, 50 cts.
=_No. 3._= This garment combines chemise and drawers, and also supplies
the place of the corset so efficiently that those who have been
accustomed to wearing the latter article are happy to dispense with it
after a single trial of this dress. It is cut to fit the bust perfectly,
thus affording all desirable support. Price, with cloth model, 75 cts.
=_No. 4. Gabrielle Dress._= This may be made either long or short to
suit the taste of the wearer. When worn with pants it should be from six
to nine inches from the floor. Those who do not wish to adopt the pants
may wear the dress two or three inches from the floor with dress drawers
and leggins. Price, 50 cts.
We can also furnish patterns for skirts, pants for short dress, and
dress drawers with leggins, at 25 cts. each.
Those who wish to secure a good fit should send the following
measurements:—
1. Bust measure, number of inches. 2. Under bust measure. 3. Waist
measure. 4. Length of waist under arm. 5. Hips, three inches below the
waist, 6. Width of back across shoulders. 7. Length of drawers from
waist down. 8. Length of back from neck to waist. 9. Length of sleeve
inside. 10. Length of sleeve outside. 11. Length of shoulder. 12. Around
neck. 13. Around arm-size (high up).
When desired, garments will be made at as reasonable rates as possible,
and sent by express. The patterns will be sent, post-paid, on receipt of
the prices marked. We employ an experienced dress-maker to cut patterns
and make garments, so that all may feel sure of obtaining a good fit if
proper measures are sent. We hope that our friends will not fail to
avail themselves of this opportunity for obtaining just what they need
for their health, comfort, and convenience.
GARMENT and STOCKING SUPPORTERS are also kept at this Office.
⁂ Address, HEALTH REFORMER,
_Battle Creek, Mich._
Health Reform Institute,
_BATTLE CREEK, MICH._
This Institution is admirably located on a site of twenty acres, in the
highest part of the pleasant and enterprising city of Battle Creek,
commanding a fine prospect, and affording opportunities for
entertainment, quiet, and retirement.
With a competent corps of Physicians and Helpers, it offers to the sick
inducements that are offered by few others. Diseases are treated in a
thorough and scientific manner, and with a degree of success impossible
under any other mode of treatment. The principal curative agents
employed are
Electricity, Water, Swedish Movements, Hot-Air Bath, and Russian Vapor
Bath.
BATTLE CREEK is an important station on the Michigan Central and Chicago
& Lake Huron Railroads, and is easy of access from all parts of the
country. ☞ For Particulars see Circular, sent Free on application.
Address, HEALTH INSTITUTE,
BATTLE CREEK, MICH.
* * * * *
BATTLE CREEK COLLEGE.
The College building is both AMPLE and ELEGANT, and the grounds are
LARGE and BEAUTIFUL. The corps of Professors comprises Instructors in
all the English branches, the Natural Sciences, and both Ancient and
Modern Languages. One of the chief attractions of this Institution is
the fact that it is
Conducted on Hygienic Principles.
The Professors are all hygienists, and inculcate hygienic truths in
their daily instructions. The College has a full Charter from the State,
and is empowered to confer Diplomas.
TERMS of TUITION are very reasonable. Good hygienic board can be
obtained at very moderate rates.
Terms for 1876–7 open as follows: Fall Term, August 30, continuing 16
weeks. Winter Term, January 3, continuing 12 weeks. Spring Term, April
31, continuing 12 weeks. All who wish further information should send
for the Annual Catalogue.
Address, BATTLE CREEK COLLEGE
_Battle Creek, Mich._
IMPROVED WATER FILTER.
[Illustration: [Filter]]
The accompanying cut is a representation of one of the greatest and most
useful inventions of the age—_Kedzie’s Improved Water Filter_.
Its mechanism is so perfect that it accomplishes all that could be
expected or desired of a filter to accomplish, and without the bestowal
of more than the slightest amount of attention. It removes from water
all those products of decay and disease which are the most prolific
causes of sickness and death.
THOUSANDS USE THEM
And admire them, and all are ready to testify to their efficiency and
utility. No family should be without one; for it is impossible to obtain
from springs or wells water which is, in all respects, so free from
injurious properties as is soft filtered water.
Five sizes are manufactured to suit the wants of all. The following
table gives their dimensions:—
No. 1, 25 inches high, reservoir holds 2 gallons.
„ 2, 27 „ „ „ „ 2½ „
„ 3, 29 „ „ „ „ 3 „
„ 4, 31 „ „ „ „ 3½ „
„ 5, 32 „ „ „ „ 4 „
=_Prices._= No. 1, $9.00; No. 2, $10.50; No. 3, $12.00; No. 4, $13.50;
No. 5, $15.00. Orders promptly filled.
Address, =_Health Reformer, Battle Creek, Mich._=
FOUNTAIN SYRINGE.
[Illustration: [Syringe]]
These syringes have become so popular through the general recognition of
their excellencies, that they have almost entirely superseded all other
styles for most purposes. The principal advantages which they offer over
others are the following: 1. They are self-acting, no pumping being
required; 2. They are valveless, and so simple in construction that they
cannot get out of order; 3. They do not inject air, and thus do not
endanger the patient; 4. By means of the sprinkler attachment, light
shower baths can be administered. 5. Various other attachments adapt
them to use for every part of the body. 6. The evenness of action with
which they operate makes them superior to every other syringe.
No family should be without one of these syringes. They are used
exclusively at the Health Institute.
=_Prices._= No. 1, $2.50; No. 2, $3.00; No. 3, $3.50.
Address, =_Health Reformer, Battle Creek, Mich._=
THE
HEALTH REFORMER.
_A HOUSEHOLD MONTHLY._
ONLY $1.00 A YEAR.
THE REFORMER is emphatically a Family Journal, being cheap, plain, and
practical, qualities which have won for it the
Largest Circulation of any Health Journal in America.
Radical, but not ultra; devoted to no party, but friendly to all
reforms; having no creed but nature’s laws; _unpartisan_, _unsectarian_,
_humanitarian_.
Though the journal is chiefly devoted to health, in consequence of the
prevailing “hard times” the publishers have recently added several
departments which make it more fully than ever
A JOURNAL FOR THE HOUSEHOLD.
_Health_, _Temperance_, _General Literature_, _Science_, _News_,
And many other interesting and practical subjects receive due attention
in its monthly columns.
The journal is now in its eleventh year, and its liberal and increasing
patronage insures its future prosperity. Every number contains
information worth more than the whole year’s subscription, about _How to
Preserve Health and How to Treat Disease with Simple Remedies_.
It has saved scores of doctors’ bills in thousands of families, together
with years of sickness, and many lives.
TERMS: $1.00 a Year, Post-paid.
Six Months on Trial for 50 cts.
☞ Send Address for Specimen Copy. ☜
Address, _HEALTH REFORMER_,
=Battle Creek, Mich.=
------------------------------------------------------------------------
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES
● Typos fixed; non-standard spelling and dialect retained.
● Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.
● Enclosed bold or blackletter font in =equals=.
● Subscripts are shown using an underscore (_) with curly braces { },
as in H_{2}O.
*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 74519 ***