Cranberry and UTIs.

Botanical name: 
Vaccinium oxycoccos
Vaccinium macrocarpon
Problems: 
Bladder infection

Newsgroups: alt.folklore.herbs
Subject: Re: Cranberry
From: dww5.psu.edu (Dale Woika)
Date: Tue, 25 Apr 1995 03:20:44 GMT

>Apparently cranberry when used to either prevent or treat bladder infection does this by interfering with the bacteria's ability to attatch to the bladder lining. My question - is this action specific to only certain types of bacteria (eg. E. coli) or will it work for all bacteria capable of causing urinary tract infection?

The active ingredient is benzoic acid. Interestingly, if cranberries were a man-made food, the makers would be unable to sell them in the U.S. as a food product because of the excessive levels of benzoic acid. Cranberry juice also changes the odor of urine, which is a principle reason the juice is a daily staple in long-term care facilities--it makes the whole facility a better place to live.

Also, it is credit to the cranberry co-ops in the New England area which have made what is essentially a practically inedible fruit, into a household word and a major beverage empire through marketing and sales. We still pick them in the fall & can the preserves for the traditional holidays, but you don't eat very many of them right off of the plant! Yikes!

Happy cranberry bog slogging!

Dale

From: ntlor.primenet.com (Sharon Rust)

> The cranberry juice cocktail in the grocery store doesn't contain a whole lot of cranberry juice and seems less effective than cranberry capsules.

My personal favorite recipe for cranberry juice for UTI is one 8 oz bag of frozen berries with either 2 apples or 1c of apple juice in a juicer or blender it is like a slushie this mixture is strong in flavor. The amount you can get down depends on how sick you are , some people I know have added water to this mixture to thin it down some. Atleast try to get 2-3 oz down in a days time. In addition marshmallow root caps or cold decoction help to soothe the inflamed tissues.

In
health, Sharon Rust

From: sjr.ecs.soton.ac.uk (Sarah Rutt)

I've found cranberry juice works faster than the antibiotics i get from my doctor on cystitis. Also it seems to stop the infection from returning, and doesn't interfere with other medication...