Hydrotherapy, formerly called hydropathy and also called water cure, is a branch of alternative medicine (particularly naturopathy), occupational therapy, and physiotherapy, that involves the use of water for pain relief and treatment. The term encompasses a broad range of approaches and therapeutic methods that take advantage of the physical properties of water, such as temperature and pressure, to stimulate blood circulation and treat the symptoms of certain diseases.
Uses
thumb|Opening of the new Hydrotherapy Pool, [[Manchester Royal Infirmary, 2009]]
Water therapy may be restricted to use as aquatic therapy, a form of physical therapy, and a cleansing agent. However, it is also used as a medium for delivering heat and cold to the body, which has long been the basis for its application. Hydrotherapy involves a range of methods and techniques, many of which use water as a medium to facilitate thermoregulatory reactions for therapeutic benefit.
Shower-based hydrotherapy techniques have been increasingly used in preference to full-immersion methods, Examples of this include directed wound irrigation and therapeutic irrigation with suction.
1700–1810
Two English works on the medical uses of water were published in the 18th century that inaugurated the new fashion for hydrotherapy. One of these was by Sir John Floyer, a physician of Lichfield, who, struck by the remedial use of certain springs by the neighbouring peasantry, investigated the history of cold bathing and published a book on the subject in 1702.
thumb|left|upright|[[Vincenz Priessnitz, who initiated the popular revival of hydrotherapy at Gräfenberg]]
Vincenz Priessnitz (1799–1851)
Vincenz Priessnitz was the son of a peasant farmer who, as a young child, observed a wounded deer bathing a wound in a pond near his home. Over several days, he would see this deer return, and eventually the wound was healed. Kneipp had a very simple view of an already simple practice. For him, hydropathy's primary goals were strengthening the constitution and removing poisons and toxins in the body. These basic interpretations of how hydropathy worked hinted at his complete lack of medical training. Kneipp did have, however, a very successful medical practice despite, perhaps even because of, his lack of medical training. As mentioned above, some patients were beginning to feel uncomfortable with traditional doctors because of the elitism of the medical profession. The new terms and techniques that doctors were using were difficult for the average person to understand. Having no formal training, all of his instructions and published works are described in easy-to-understand language and would have seemed very appealing to a patient who was displeased with the direction traditional medicine was taking. over June, July and August 1843, with two subsequent lectures in Glasgow.
Some other Englishmen preceded Claridge to Graefenberg, although not many. One of these was James Wilson, who himself, along with James Manby Gully, established and operated a water cure establishment at Malvern in 1842. In 1843, Wilson and Gully published a comparison of the efficacy of the water-cure with drug treatments, including accounts of some cases treated at Malvern, combined with a prospectus of their Water Cure Establishment. Then in 1846 Gully published The Water Cure in Chronic Disease, further describing the treatments available at the clinic.
The fame of the water-cure establishment grew, and Gully and Wilson became well-known national figures. Two more clinics were opened at Malvern. Famous patients included Charles Darwin, Charles Dickens, Thomas Carlyle, Florence Nightingale, Lord Tennyson and Samuel Wilberforce.
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From the 1840s, hydropathics were established across Britain. Initially, many of these were small institutions, catering to at most dozens of patients. By the later nineteenth century, the typical hydropathic establishment had evolved into a more substantial undertaking, with thousands of patients treated annually for weeks at a time in a large purpose-built building with lavish facilities – baths, recreation rooms and the like – under the supervision of fully trained and qualified medical practitioners and staff. (especially in Scotland), the number of hydropathic establishments rapidly increased. Antagonism ran high between the old practice and the new. Unsparing condemnation was heaped by each on the other; and a legal prosecution, leading to a royal commission of inquiry, served but to make Priessnitz and his system stand higher in public estimation. and Russell Thacher Trall in the 1840s. They then spread across the country as fast as they did in the British Isles, making a similar impact on hydropathic practice.
Following the introduction of hydrotherapy to the U.S., John Harvey Kellogg employed it at Battle Creek Sanitarium, which opened in 1866, where he strove to improve the scientific foundation for hydrotherapy. and before World War II, various forms of hydrotherapy were used to treat alcoholism.
Alternating the temperatures, either in a shower or complementary tanks, combines hot and cold in the same session. Proponents claim improvement in the circulatory system and lymphatic drainage. Experimental evidence suggests that contrast hydrotherapy helps to reduce injury in the acute stages by stimulating blood flow and reducing swelling.
Society and culture
The growth of hydrotherapy and various forms of hydropathic establishments resulted in a form of tourism, both in the UK,
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