[Kidney and bladder 163]

Bladder trouble.  Mothers’ Remedies. 1.  English Oil of Sandal Wood for.—­“Get one ounce of the pure English oil of sandal wood, take four drops three times a day in a little water.  As you urinate more freely reduce the dose.  This is a splendid remedy.”

2.  Bladder Trouble, Effective Herb Teas for.—­“Make a tea of half ounce of buchu leaves, half ounce of uva ursi leaves (barberry leaves), one pint of boiling water.  Dose:  Two or three tablespoonfuls three times a day, or may drink quite freely.”  A tea made of cornsilk is a common and standard remedy.

Treatment.—­Remove cause if possible.  Fomentations of hops, smartweed, wormwood are good, even hot water over the bladder.  Hot hip bath is good, and also the warm foot bath.  The bowels should be kept open with saline laxatives.  Buchu tea is very good.  Use about one-half ounce of the leaves to a pint of warm water and let it steep, not boil.  Drink freely of this.  Pumpkin seed tea or watermelon seed tea is good, also flaxseed tea.  Dr. Hare recommends the following at the beginning if there is fever: 

Tincture of Aconite             3 drams
Sweet Spirits of Nitre          1 ounce
Solution of Citrate of Potash   enough to make 6 ounces

Mix.

Give a dessertspoonful every four hours until all fever ceases and the pulse is quiet.  The patient should be kept quiet.

Diet.—­Should be milk only.

Chronic inflammation of the bladder.—­Causes.—­It follows repeated attacks; partial retention of urine in the bladder, decomposing there; Bright’s disease, inflammation of the urethra, injury, etc.

Treatment.—­Wash out the bladder with pure warm water or water containing about one to two teaspoonfuls of boric acid to the pint of warm water.  This should be given once or twice a day; or enough permanganate of potash can be put into the water to give the water a tinge of the color.  An injection of golden seal, one teaspoonful to the pint of warm water, is good if there is much mucus.  The best way to give the irrigation is to attach a small funnel to a soft rubber catheter and fill the bladder by raising the funnel when full of water above the patient’s belly; or you can attach the rubber tube of a fountain syringe to a catheter at one end and to a funnel at the other and raise the funnel to the desired height; or you can attach a catheter to the rubber tube of a fountain syringe (clean one) and raise syringe high enough to allow the water to run into the bladder gently.  The patient will stand just about so much water.  The rubber can then be detached from the catheter and the water allowed to run out.

[164 Mothers’ remedies]