chronic urinary and kidney infections!

[murray hill farm]

I am on maintenance Cipro..3x a week...but wondered if u folks could suggest some useful supplement. I do take cranberry daily. Thanks! Also..aeromic therapies? essential oils? Whatever ya got..i am interested..ha!!

[Pallas180]

1. Mexico Pat - sounds like your doctor has things under control -

and maybe you'd better stick with him/her.

Anyway, no one here gives medical advice.

We just discuss what we are taking and the results we have noted.

[murray hill farm]

4. Oh yeah!!!

I will definitly stick with my docs treatment plan...ha..and i am scheduled for a work up when i am in the usa this summer. I am not looking for medical advice, but wondered if anyone here knew of any herbal suppliments that might also be helpful. I dont know that much about essential oils and herbs, but i think many are specific..no sure of that either..but wondered if anyone had more information on the subject. thank you for responding..all who did..and yep that water is a must..tons of it...and it really does make a difference..but gotta stick with it all the time. Anyway..thanks for the responses. I appreciate it very much.

[NMDemDist2]

2. (literally) gallons of water

drank daily

[Desertrose]

3. Yup...water is a must!

dilute & flush out toxins!! Helps the body to function properly!!

My big thing is that most people don't drink nearly enough ( or any!!) water....like running a car with low oil or no oik!!


:hi: AZDem6...we got snow here after all the rain...maybe about 3-4"...have to head to the high country today...they got about 35"!! AK!

also a :hi: to mexicopat..welcome :)
DR

[NMDemDist2]

8. Oak Creek to the Verde River to the Salt River

they had to close the 202 cause the Salt river was eroding one of the bridge supports with all the water

more coming on Friday night too....

but don't you just love living where you get snow you can "shovel" with your garden hose LOL

careful driving in Flag tho!! :hug:

PS ---- sorry about hijacking your thread MexPat

[murray hill farm]

16. no problem..ha

well..weather sounds bad...what is happening?

[DemExpat]

5. My daughter had recurring infections and we basically followed

most of these tips which do not interfere with doctor's treatments:
http://www.drweil.com/u/HC/HCA219/#2

We live in a cold, windy climate and I felt keeping her lower body warm helped with this too...

Best of luck, mexicopat!

DemEx

[murray hill farm]

6. Thanks, Demexpat

From one expat to another?

[DemExpat]

7. Yep....

:hi:

DemEx

[Nancy Waterman]

9. There are several homeopathic remedies

The most common one is cantharis. It has tremendous burning, some intense itching, and irritability as the most common symptoms. You would probably need to do the antibiotics anyway, but the remedy might stop the imbalance that keeps you repeating the infection. I would also take a ton of acidophylus to counteract the weakening of the immune system that comes from killing all the good bacteria. Take about 5x whatever the bottle says for several months.

Also, do not use regular soap in that area. It is a tremendous irritant. There are soap-free cleansers for sensitive skin at the drug store and at the health food store. Nutribiotic Skin Cleanser can be bought at the hfs. Shaklee makes Meadow Blend.

[PinkTiger]

13. Actually, real soap won't hurt.

It is the commercial, detergent based "soaps" that cause the harm.
Natural, pure soap won't hurt anything except your eyes.

I make my own soap because I'm allergic to commercial brands.

[murray hill farm]

19. I have just started making my own soap!

I love it! It is surprisingly easy..and so much fun!

[murray hill farm]

17. Thanks lots for this info

i will give it a try..as soon as i can find it..difficult to find many such suppliments where i live in mexico...they are here, i am sure...i am looking more seriously these days. What i have is a long term chronic problem..it is rarely a bladder infrection..with the pain and burning, but is in the kidneys..which i am sure are some damaged from 40 or so years of this stuff..it is not debilitation or anything like that..but i have just gone throug a serious battle with it..so have been thinking of finding ways to suppliment the antibiotics...which do develop resistance after ten or so years of use..i have been dealing with it for about 40 yrs..and have gone through a number of antibiotics..i am sure that is what is happening now...need a new one. I will have a work up of tests, etc. when i am in the usa this summer..and if think..knock on wood or something..ha..that this little adventure with it is over for now. Thank you so much for giving me this info...and i will try anything, i think.hahahaha!!

[yellowdawgdem]

33. uva ursi

is really helpful to strengthen the bladder and desensitize it. You can make tea and add uva ursi drops to the tea, if not strong enough. Once your bladder is strengthened, you don't need to continue the tea, but just start again when/if the problem comes back. It's pretty strong stuff.
Another really good curative is raw garlic. In fact, I read in a health journal that the 3 most helpful things you can take each day are raw garlic, green tea, and turmeric. Garlic for a bladder infection is most effective if you peel some cloves and insert them into your body, either vaginal or anal. You leave them until they get mushy, then replace with fresh ones. If you keep doing this for 3 months or so, the problem will often be resolved, because bacteria cannot grow in such an environment.

[Trillo]

10. Drink clean, purified water.

Many years ago a friend had chronic urinary infections. What finally made them go away was drinking clean, purified water, always. This person had been drinking tap water.

[murray hill farm]

18. Yep..i definitely agree with that suggestion!

I live in Mexico...so purified water is all that i ever drink. we do have a little home in georgia..and will be spending our summers there in the future...when we were there in October and Nov, we still drank only purified water..amusingly, a large bottle here costs 1.60...and in georgia...6.50...that was an unpleasant surprise.

[Trillo]

21. Let the buyer beware!

I've read of conflicting reports regarding the quality of bottled water: some is likely very good, some apparently isn't any better than tap water. Investing in some equipment to purify your own water may offer a long-term cost advantage to buying bottled water.

The water that my friend was drinking was Southern California water from 15 years ago. Most people don't have any apparent problems with the water here, and as far as I know it is safe to drink straight out of the tap. However, it runs around 8.2 on the alkaline/acid scale.

Maybe the dissolved hardness solids, leeching from natural and artificial deposits, had something to do with my friend's problems, maybe not.

While the following water quality report is not from 15 years ago, it does give one an idea of what was in Metropolitan Water District water back in 2000.
http://www.ci.pasadena.ca.us/waterandpower/water_qualityreport_2000_mwdchart.asp

Georgia water, and so too Mexico's, likely have their own unique quality characteristics.

[Pathwalker]

22. What about water filters - do they help?

I have well water, which has repeatedly tested very, very "pure", is Ph neutral, but high only in Iron and calcium. Still, I use a faucet filter for drinking, and a whole house softening system - are these good for purification. I read a long time ago that many bottled waters are actually nothing more than municipal tap water, so I've never used them.

[Trillo]

23. Notorious Bohemian, yes, but ...

I'm not a water quality engineer, nor do I sell water purification equipment.

Anyway, I presume you are using cation exchange water softener to remove the calcium and iron: those systems replace the calcium ion with either a sodium or potassium ion. It's my understanding that a cation exchange water softener will usually remove only small amounts of iron. A manganese greensand filter will remove moderate amounts of iron; for even larger amounts of iron, chlorine injection produces an iron precipitate which is followed by sediment filters to remove the precipitate and which in turn is followed by carbon filtration to remove the chlorine.

A distiller or reverse osmosis system will further purify the water from your cation exchange, if you want the sodium or potassium ion removed from your drinking water, and those systems will also remove both iron and calcium without pre-softening. Anyway, here's are a few explanatory sites about water purification written by people much more knowledgeable than I and who don't appear to be selling particular systems:
Well Water Quality and Home Treatment Systems.
http://www.uhl.uiowa.edu/services/environment/waterquality/wellwater/homewater.pdf
Household water treatment
http://www.ext.vt.edu/pubs/housing/356-481/356-481.html
Iron and manganese removal
http://www.extension.umn.edu/distribution/naturalresources/DD5940.html

Hope that helps.

[NMDemDist2]

24. i have a friend who used to sell and maintain reverse osmosis systems

and he wouldn't have one on a bet... says they grow nasty bacteria in those big blue filters :scared:

[Trillo]

25. Pluses and minuses!

Some people don't like the taste of water from them, either, claiming the water tastes "flat". Standard home RO units usually have a sediment filter, followed by a carbon filter, followed by the membrane itself (there are several different types of membranes), followed by a storage tank, followed by another carbon filter; the best ones also have a U.V. light right before the tap to sterilize the water. One big benefit to RO systems is their long-term low cost of water treatment, but, most people don't flush the storage tanks or replace the filters regularly, and some merchants sell replacement filters with 1000% or more markup from their bulk cost!

Yes, filters that haven't been properly maintained can be nasty!

(Is this getting off-topic from UTIs?)

[NMDemDist2]

26. not off topic if there is an issue with her water filter n/t

[Pathwalker]

27. I asked about water filters because everyone says

you need to drink lots of water to help with these infections, which I also suffer. Then, others said it was important that one drink only purified water because people who drank tap water got sick. I don't see how that is off topic.
I have issues with drinking lots of water; I followed a doctor's advice to drink more and more water because of my kidney problems - he had me drinking FIFTEEN glasses of water every day. Then, one day - MY BLADDER COLLAPSED - fell OUT of my body! The Doctor was reprimanded, then fired, but I had to have surgery to fix my bladder - because I followed that damned doctor's advice! Now, I am very, very leery about drinking lots of water, but I know I need to drink more liquids than I do, so I am CONSIDERING drinking it again, but I want to be sure it is clean and pure - I don't want to get sick from bad water.

This was the Doctor from HELL, he was so bad I had to CONVINCE him that I could not take a second Glucose Tolerance test, even though it was well established that I was, and had been a Diabetic for four years! Had I taken that second test, I would have been insulin dependent, and I refused to allow that to happen. I went over his head that time and he finally was taught that you don't ask a diabetic to take that test. The man was a menace, who is no longer practicing in my area, but I'm sure he's still out there, "practicing" on others.

I'd rather follow the advice here than need that particular surgery again!

[DemExpat]

28. I was into Macrobiotics in the 80s....

and that dietary system of healing calls for no extra water intake - ever.
A little bit of green tea is all that is allowed on this diet, and healing is supposedly aided by not drinking too much water - which makes the body too Yin...
(Macrobiotics has to do with creating the best balance of Yin and Yang in the body/psyche for optimum health).

So, yeah, I can imagine that for some, drinking lots of water is detrimental.

DemEx

[Trillo]

29. Nope, not what I wrote...

"Then, others said it was important that one drink only purified water because people who drank tap water got sick"

I think I was the other to whom you refer, but that's not quite what I wrote. I certainly didn't write that tap water makes all people sick. I was writing of one particular person, and I offered it as a suggestion here because UTIs, as you know, are extremely uncomfortable, and anyone with them might like to try anything to help prevent the pain from occurring in the first place. This tactic of drinking only pure water, using pure water to make all beverages including teas and coffees and diluting of concentrated fruit juices, as well as lugging the pure water to work to drink appeared to prevent "one person's" previously chronic UTIs.

All of this drink-lots-of-water versus minimizing-water-intake seems like a rather personal decision best left up to the individual. If something isn't broken, why fix it? If something is broken, there may be multiple ways to fix the problem. What works to fix it for one may not work as well for others.

[Pallas180]

11. I'm wondering what the cause of the constant infection is -

I had a friend who had infections, burning all the time. It had something to do with the urethra (I think it was)being too narrow
and the docs did a stretching thing in the hospital which relieved a lot of it I guess. At least I didn't hear much about it after that.

[Pallas180]

12. Come to think of it, for many years I had a urninary problem which turned

out to be tiny bits of sand (known as kidney stones) passing. I was put on ampicillin and kept it in the medicine cabinet at all times.
For some reason, after a certain age it stopped. Thank goodness.

[PinkTiger]

14. Yes - I had that procedure done.

It is fantastic, but it does have one side effect:
You have trouble not peeing when you cough or laugh.

Don't laugh.

[Pallas180]

15. lol -Pink Tiger - my sympathies...but it;'s better than the discomfort

and pain of the burning.

[PinkTiger]

31. Yes, Pallas

But it is a bother; especially when I get a coughing fit.

I was sick so much, though, and so very, very ill one time that I was hospitalized, that I'm glad not to have that.
Just wish it didn't interfere with aerobics. Can't take a class -- the jumping up and down causes quite a problem.

[murray hill farm]

20. no one knows the cause!

anatomically OK...dont get infections easily..heal quickly, etc. Mine is in kidneys..almost always..and i rarely have the burning, etc that comes with bladder infection. Usually, the antibiotics that i take keep it under control, but have had this for 40 or so years..and after 10 or so years, whatever antibiotic i am taking falls short due to resistance..and then i have to find a new one...the cipro i take now..a maintenance dosage..i have been taking for over 10 yrs..so, i am sure that is what is the problem now..hopefully my doc can find a new one for me to change to now..the tons of water really helps too..and thank you for responding to this plea for help from me..i really am fine now..and have basically knocked out my recent adventure with UTI..so, really am looking for just some boost in the way of herbs or such..and the responses here have been really helpful. thanks!!

[Nancy Waterman]

30. Have you tried acupuncture?

You might ask around for a recommended acupuncturist. That could help put you back into balance. You would need to get several sessions.

[murray hill farm]

32. Have u tried acupunture?

For this? For something else? I really have been thinking of doing this! Anyone have additional info..thanks!!