Cranberry in urinary tract infections.
Date: Mon, 18 Sep 1995 01:10:37 EDT
Sender: HERB.TREARNPC.EGE.EDU.TR
From: KIM MAYROSE <SCA.PRODIGY.COM>
Subject: Re: cranberry juice
> I saw your response containing the note aboaut cranberrey juice. Cranberry juice actually makes your uring MORE acidic. Cranberries contanin phenolic acid which can not be metabolized by the body and is passed
into the urine. Thereby making it hostile to bacteria, which don't like acid conditions.
Yes, I have read that cranberry juice will make your urine more acidic in some resources, but in others I have read the opposite. I have to go by what works for me, and the cranberry juice does seem to anesthetize the urethra (at least in my case). It's something I can't explain, but it works for me and several other women I know that have tried it. Go figure!
From: Paul Stewart <stewart.CYCOR.CA>
> the cranberry juice does seem to anesthetize the urethra
Wasn't there a posting to this list in the past two months concerning a substance in cranberry that actually affects the ability of the bacteria to adhere to the mucous membranes of the urinary tract, allowing them to be flushed out? Anybody recall this?...I have erased the posting.
From: KIM MAYROSE <SCA.PRODIGY.COM>
> I'm not disputing that drinking cranbeery juice with "anesthetize the urethra" as you said. But that does not mean the juice DID NOT make the urine more acid. With an acidic urine, it might have felt that the urethra and been anesthetized. Or after all the problems with infection, it certainly felt anesthetized! But what ever the explanation, it does work! That is the main point of drinking the cranberry juice!
I am not trying to be argumentative here, truly I am not. I would be very much interested in any research that you can direct me to that states that cranberry juice makes the urine more acidic. The reason I ask, is that our former pediatrician told me the opposite when he suspected my older daughter had a bladder infection a few years ago, and one of my previous gynecologists had told me the same, as did my grandmother's gynecologist. Any further info you can pass along, would be much appreciated.
From: David Eagle <eagle.NETCOM.COM>
>Many people are under the impression that cranberry juice makes the urine more acidic, thereby more effective at destroying bacteria. Others believe the presence of hippuric acid, found in cranberry juice, adds additional benefit. However, hippuric acid is found in insufficient amounts, and one would have to consume alot (about 2 pints) of cranberry juice to produce acidic urine to be of any value in checking bacteria.
>Most researchers agree that the main action of cranberry juice is that it prevents bacterium from adhering to the lining of the bladder and urethra, thereby inhibiting the development of infection.
If you have a bladder infection and check the pH of your urine, you will find that drinking pure cranberry juice (usually 1 quart or more per day) will alter the pH of the urine if the pH was alkaline to begin with. If the pH of the urine was acid to begin with, drinking cranberry juice is contra-indicated.
Of course this does not always stop the infection, but for chronic suffers the ability to monitor pH of urine and use cranberry to acidify or vitamin C to make more alkaline can stop an infection before it gets started.
--
eagle.netcom.com - David Eagle, OMD, LAc
