Hydropathy

“ If, as certain French physicians maintain, sea-water baths have only a mechanical action, infuse no new principle into the blood and are merely a simple branch of hydropathy, it must be confessed that of all the forms of hydropathy they are the harshest and most hazardous. Let it once be clearly shown that that sea-water, so rich in life, bestows no more of vitality than fresh water and we must confess that it is little less than madness to take sea-baths in the open air and at all the risk of the wind, the sun, and the thousand possible accidents. ”

“ It may be stated without the fear of contradiction (not a word has been written to the contrary) , that in small-pox, scarlatina, measles, croup, and all the complaints incidental to children; in fevers, inflammations, cholera, cholic, dysentery, diarrhoea, and, in fact, all acute diseases, hydropathy competently administered is omnipotent; and that in chronic complaints it effects more than can be obtained by any other means. The question is frequently put, “Will hydropathy cure all complaints?” I answer it is no catholicon, no panacea; nor is any cure for all diseases to be found. ”

“ 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. ”

“ That Hydropathy is capable of strengthening and invigorating these organs, is well known to all who have tried it, and is even admitted by its greatest opponents when they state, “Oh! it is good for the general health,” for it is utterly impossible for the “general health” to be good without a sound digestion. ”

“ Perhaps there is no disease which would appear, at first sight, so little suited for Hydropathic treatment as cholera;15 that disease for the successful treatment of which we have been hitherto accustomed to consider stimulants and hot applications of all kinds as indispensably necessary, and yet there is no disease, in the treatment of which Hydropathy has been more successful. ”

“ This being the case, the natural and common sense mode of curing disease, would obviously consist in assisting nature in its efforts to expel the morbid substance from the system, and thus relieve it from the danger which threatened it. Now, this is exactly the principle on which Hydropathy proceeds; it aids, encourages, and strengthens the efforts of nature to heal herself, instead of irritating, thwarting, and weakening those efforts, by the pernicious administration of drugs. ”

“ So that, if hydropathy be not very scientific, it is certainly a clever scheme; and as there are very many people who require nothing but good air, plain living, rest from their anxious occupations, with agreeable society,—it is very possible that many hydropathic patients get well, by just doing that which they could not be induced to do before. ”

“ Like many descriptive names, the word “hydropathy” is defective and even misleading, the active agents in the treatment being heat and cold, of which water 166 is little more than the vehicle, and not the only one. Thermotherapeutics (or thermotherapy) is a term less open to objection.
Hydropathy, as a formal system, dates from about 1829, when Vincenz Priessnitz (1801-1851) , a farmer of Gräfenberg in Silesia, Austria, began his public career in the paternal homestead, extended so as to accommodate the increasing numbers attracted by the fame of his cures. ”

“ If it be asked why Hydropathy has proved itself so effective a remedy in curing rheumatism, we would answer, on account of its great power in strengthening and invigorating the stomach and digestive organs, in the derangement of which, the cause of that disease is to be found. Rheumatism proceeds from a sluggish circulation in the extremities, consequent on a low vitality in the system, arising from a derangement of the digestive organs and viscera ”

“ The very simplicity of the processes of the “water-cure,” which people cannot believe capable of producing the effects ascribed to them, combined with a belief, ingrained by long habit, in the absolute necessity for drugs in curing disease, have chiefly militated against a more extended reception of Hydropathy by the lay public ”

“ Sir Charles Scudamore, M.D., records his opinion as follows:—
“The principles of the water-cure treatment are founded in nature and truth. We have in our power a new and most efficacious agent for the alleviation and cure of disease in various forms, and in proper hands as safe as it is effectual. I should be no friend to humanity nor to medical science if I did not give my testimony in its recommendation.”
Dr. James Johnson, Editor of the Medical Quarterly, thus writes of hydropathy:—
“Its paramount virtue is that of preserving many a constitution from pulmonary consumption.” ”

“ The constitution of water being unknown, and supposed to consist of only the gases, hydropathy is condemned, like mesmerism, through the ignorance and intolerance of professionals, themselves falsely educated at best. As alimentary, water is the most wholesome drink under heaven; as medicinal, far beyond comparison with extracts from metals and minerals, from which deduct the water, the remainder kills. The hydropathic perspiration cleanses the flesh from head to foot; physic, the intestines and stomach only. ”

“ Hydropathy deals with a very potent agent, and applies it to a very powerful and important organ, the skin; and it employs in combination the energetic influences, temperature and moisture;350 so that we may be assured there will be very little that is equivocal or infinitesimal in its results; that in almost every case it must do good or harm.
But it does not limit itself to these agencies. It has "establishments;" that is to say, pleasant rural retreats, tastefully laid-out gardens; plain diet; often, no doubt, agreeable society; rational amusements ”

“ We claim nothing for hydropathy on the score of novelty, because it is well known that in India the natives understand the use of cold water in curing fevers, wounds, bruises, etc.; in all probability it has been their panacea for all diseases since the time of Noah. ”

“ A young man aged 23, attacked with secondary symptoms: sore throat, etc., was ordered three packing-sheets and cold baths a-day; rubbing-sheet and sitz-bath.
I knew another strong young man suffering under secondary symptoms, so that he could hardly walk with the use of a stick; he went to Gräfenberg, staid there two months, and returned to England the picture of health.
As there are always at Gräfenberg a large number of individuals labouring under these complaints, cases of cure might be adduced ad infinitum: suffice it to say, that hydropathy in their cure is omnipotent. ”

“ There can be no doubt of the complete omnipotence of Hydropathy over this malady; its cure is only a matter of time. It is difficult to lay down any prescribed treatment, as the chief aim of the practitioner must be to bring his patient into fine health. All organic action is contraction; all strength depends upon the power of the different parts of the body to contract, and nothing will aid the operation so much as the different appliances here made use of. As a rule, I observed that when rupture exudes, the sweating process should be resorted to ”

“ Is it not true that nature makes water in great quantities often for special cases or conditions, for relief purposes, such as in asiatic cholera, cholera morbus, chills and fever; when the contents of stomach, bowels and skin run off many gallons of water, running through sheet and mattress and on floor, not from kidneys but skin. Is it not plain to the man of reason that the two gases, oxygen and hydrogen, do unite in the lungs, form water and give supply to this great river of water that washes life out in but a few hours in cases of cholera and other diseases. ”

“ Therefore we are obliged to regard many of the processes which have been contrived to lengthen out the play at hydropathic institutions, not only as ridiculous, but positively injurious. It has never been pretended that water was unimportant in the treatment of disease—rational medicine has always employed it, and must continue to do so whilst the world stands. ”

“ Whatever impedes the evaporation of water from the body leads, of necessity, to some derangement of the body, if not to disease; for the retained moisture, saturating the garments, produces chilliness of surface, and checks the action of the skin. Then follow cold, dyspepsia, and, in those who are disposed to it, rheumatism. For these reasons I always hold that the so-called waterproofs are sources of great danger, unless they are used with great discrimination. It is true they keep the body dry in wet weather, but they wet it through from its own rain ”

“ These substances rarely occur in our wells and springs and hence they need no particular consideration here, though, if present, only analysis is a safe means of detection.
Where water contains a large amount of mineral matter, it has a decided effect upon the digestive organs, and, after shorter or longer use, tends to produce diseases, such as dyspepsia, constipation, gravel, &c., &c. But waters with a large enough amount of mineral matter to give them a decided taste, are called “mineral waters” and are used rather as medicine, than as a habitual means of slaking thirst. ”

“ Water is necessary, not only for digestion, nutrition, and all functional processes of life, but it is indispensable as a menstruum for medicinal substances. It is a necessary agent in depuration, or the process of purifying the animal economy, for it dissolves and holds in solution deleterious matter, which in this state may be expelled from the body. In fevers, water is necessary to quench the thirst, promote absorption, and incite the skin and kidneys to action. Its temperature may be varied according to requirements. Diluents are the vehicles for introducing medicine into the system. ”

“ Should putrid symptoms appear, I would advise the use of mineral acids and chloride of lime, in addition to hydriatic treatment.
109. In no case would I advise a hydriatic practitioner to overdo, either in regard to the temperature or to the quantity of the baths. The state of the brain and of the skin should always guide him. The increase of delirium will require a bath, and the dryness and heat of the skin a pack. If both symptoms exist, the bath is to be preferred, as the condition of the nervous system should always command the principal attention of the physician. ”

“ The human body is constantly throwing off water. A large portion is lost by evaporation from the skin, upon which it is poured out by millions of what might be termed little sewer pipes or sweat ducts, for the purpose of washing away impurities from the system. The kidneys remove a considerable quantity, bearing with it poisonous elements in solution, the product of various vital activities. In other ways water is removed from the body, to the amount of about five pints in twenty-four hours. ”

“ It may not be uninteresting to observe, that under Hydropathic treatment, chronic disease frequently becomes acute; for, as the body improves in strength, the more acutely will any [37] existing disease develop itself, and for the following reason: pain is caused by an effort of nature to relieve the system of some morbid influence residing in it, and the stronger the constitution, the greater efforts will it make to remove that morbid influence, and therefore the greater will be the pain ”

“ The effects produced by the foreign matters which water may contain, are more considerable, and of greater importance, than might at first be imagined. It cannot be denied, that such waters as are hard, or loaded with earthy matter, have a decided effect upon some important functions of the human body. They increase the distressing symptoms under which those persons labour who are afflicted with what is commonly called gravel complaints; and many other ailments might be named, that are always aggravated by the use of waters abounding in saline and earthy substances. ”

“ They excite the skin much more than the liquid baths,—cause a greater degree of redness—bring out more eruptions—and stimulate the nerves of the surface, as well as the vessels. They are employed by the Marienbad physicians in all those cases where the mineral-water baths are used. They are preferred, however, to the latter, in all those maladies where the natural and salutary crisis takes place chiefly through the excretories of the surface, and by determination to the joints, as in gout; and in those cases where the disease is attributed to checked perspiration. ”

“ Water, being the necessary solvent of the solid matters in all the fluid secretions, is secreted in greater or less quantity by all the important glands. The kidneys are the chief emunctories of water,—i.e. they have to separate it from the blood [Pg 274] when it has entered in an unnatural amount. But in the excretion of water there exists a compensating relation between the skin, kidneys, and bowels,—particularly between the two former. So that when water is not properly excreted by the kidneys, it may pass out by the skin, and vice versâ. ”

“ At other times, too, the patient’s system appears to be in a state highly calculated to favor cracking or chapping of the surface, such as we observe in many persons, who, when they commence bathing, find their hands and feet becoming very sore. These are always evidences of impurity in the body, and the proof of this fact is found in the circumstance, that if they set resolutely at work to renovate their health by the hydropathic treatment, they become cured of the symptoms, just in proportion as they become firmer and more vigorous in general health. ”