Of all the reasons you might visit a doctor, urinary tract infections (UTIs) are the second most common each year. While UTI can affect male wellness, they’re far more known for impacting your sexual health as a woman. More than eight million women go to the GP for UTI treatment every year, and 20% of these women will find that a UTI affects their wellbeing a second time. When that rolls around, these women will know it instantly, as you never forget the symptoms of a UTI: First you suddenly and frequently feel the need to use the toilet, and then you find you can squeeze out only a little bit of urine. This would only be annoying, if not for the burning sensation in your bladder and/or urethra that accompanies this lack of urination. Extreme cases can even lead to fever, chills, back pain, and blood in your urine. However, the good news is that you can try a number of home remedies to prevent or treat a UTI.
1. Baking Soda: If your UTI lasts for longer than two days, you need to get medical attention. If left untreated, a UTI can infect your kidneys and turn into a much more serious problem. However, before you let it get to that point, you can ease your infection – or nip it in the bud – by adding a teaspoon of baking soda to a glass of water. The baking soda works to neutralise the acidity in your urine which, in turn, speeds along your recovery.
2. Cranberry Juice: Cranberries have special properties for fighting UTIs, with many studies demonstrating that drinking cranberry juice helps to prevent the infections. UTIs are caused by bacteria that bed down in your bladder, but cranberry juice prevents this from happening, and also has a very mild antibiotic affect. To keep your bladder infection-free generally, you only need drink as little as four ounces of cranberry juice a day. However, if you already have a UTI, or tend to get them on and off, you should aim to drink at least two to four glasses a day. That said, cranberry juice is not a replacement for doctor-prescribed antibiotics in treating your infection.
3. Blueberries: The bacteria-inhibiting properties in cranberries are also found in blueberries. It’s easy to add more blueberries to your diet – just sprinkle a handful over your cereal in the morning, and let the flavourful, good-for-you berries do the rest!
4. Pineapples: An enzyme found in pineapples, known as bromelain, has been shown to be a key ingredient in fighting UTIs. In one study, researchers gave UTI sufferers bromelain alongside their usual round of antibiotics, and this got rid of their infection.
5. Water: It sounds simple, but drinking plenty of water is a key preventative measure for most conditions, including UTIs. If you tend to get urinary tract infections, you should aim to drink about eight eight-ounce glasses of water every day, so that you urinate at least every four to five hours. Drinking buckets of water can help you fight off any UTIs you may currently have, so try to drink a full eight ounces of water every hour. This will help flush out bacteria by making you go to the toilet more frequently. Another way water can help when you have a UTI is to use it in a hot water bottle. Putting the water bottle on your lower abdomen can help to ease any pain caused by the infection.
6. Vitamin C: For patients who develop recurrent urinary tract infections, some doctors prescribe at least 5,000 mg or more of vitamin C a day. This is because vitamin C acidifies the urine.