Medical reflections on the water cure. / By James Freeman, M. D. Physician to the Cheltenham Hydropathic Institution.

  • Freeman, James.
Date:
1842
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Medical reflections on the water cure. / By James Freeman, M. D. Physician to the Cheltenham Hydropathic Institution. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    16/64 (page 10)
    to give exit to a smaller or larger quantity of water. Careful rubbing with a dry cloth, fol- lowed by active exercise, and water drinking, are as indispensable here as they are after the full- bath. It is not necessary to describe those local baths, the nature of which is indicated by their names, such' as the foot-bath, hand-bath, eye- bath, &c. It is obvious that they consist merely in the application of cold water, in the most con- venient manner, to the parts indicated by those terms ; or to any other part where local applica- tion is considered necessary. But of the sitz- batli a few words may be said. This is a bath containing cold water about a foot in depth, in which the patient sits, with his legs out of the bath, for a period varying from five minutes to an hour. The impression of cold is at first very intense, but it is succeeded by a delightful glow, caused by the rapid afflux of blood on quitting the bath, and taking exercise. By this afflux of blood, the quantity of that fluid is sensibly di- minished in the superior parts of the body; whereby the sitz-bath becomes a valuable remedy in affections seated in the head or chest. It is also of essential service in disorders of the diges- tive organs. Active friction of the back, abdo- men and thighs, is maintained during the time the patient remains in this bath ; the upper and lower extremities may remain clothed. Injections of cold water are eflfected in exactly the same manner as other injections. They vary