Tips for a female UTI?

I’ve always heard to drink cranberry juice. I’ve done it and it seems to work. Even in the nursing home I used to work in they gave the residents cranberry juice daily just for urinary tract health.

Whole cranberry sauce
This brand of products works very well
And AZO has test strips so you can see what the problem is if you don’t think it’s a UTI

Get well soon.

Ugh. UTIs are awful.
You could call your local Planned Parenthood and see if they’ll treat you for a UTI.
Go to the store and get some Azo. It won’t clear up the infection- you still need to see a dr or it could get way more serious- but Azo takes away the pain and the discomfort.

@knitfroggy I always thought cranberry juice (as pure as possible) is good for prevention, not curing. No?

I think the cranberry juice is a good preventative medicine, but once you have the urinary tract infection cranberry juice is no help, I believe the only way to get rid of it, is with antibiotics. You seriously need to get medicine, they give you medicine for the burning and antibiotics for the infection, once you are on the antibiotics for even an hour, the burn is gone. After you do get rid of the UTI, drink plenty of cranberry juice to prevent the UTI from coming back and of course, do not ever hold your pee.

you can also take cranberry pills that you can get from trader joes, whole foods, or any other “earthy” store. I hate the taste of cranberry juice and am no stranger to UTIs.

So… The only cure is antibiodics? how does a non insured person ( fucking American health system) get these?

;-(

I disagree with the need for antibiotics… I have never had to take those…

From experience (I’m prone to UTIs), the only thing you can do is get some antibiotics. It will just get worse and worse (and eventually travel to her kidneys and cause more pain than you can imagine, trust me). Try to find a sliding-scale clinic or one of those walk-in deals. Once you get the scrip, you can probably get it filled cheap at Wal-Mart or another place that has lots of $4 meds.

Someone posted on another thread that pure cranberry (or cranberry pills) is very effective for prevention. I tried taking them once I had a UTI and it didn’t help at all.

The witch doctor tricks have never worked for me…the spin around three times, look to the moon when it sits in the western sky and place a sprig of thyme under your pillow and “BAM!!” the UTI is gone by morning. If you want to knock this thing out for good and get on with life, find some antibiotics stat.

You can go to a local urgent care clinic (like the kind they have at the supermarket or chain pharmacy). A nurse practicioner can readily diagnose a UTI, and most of the antibiotics that are effective against UTIs are dirt cheap (like, less than $10 for the prescription for nitrofurantoin or amoxicillin). Make sure to tell them you don’t have insurance so that they prescribe the cheapest option. Anyone who says you don’t need antibiotics has never suffered through a UTI or seen someone who allows an untreated UTI to develop into a severe kidney infection (pyelonephritis).

Awesome. Thanks so
much everyone. I don’t think it is, but just to be sure, is this life or death? Or can it wait until Tom morning? ( it’s 1:00
am est)

@patg7590 Get Azo from a 24hour mart now if she’s really uncomfortable. UTI’s are uncomfortable like nothing I’ve ever experienced, and the discomfort can be hard to verbalize. And put a heating pad over her bladder (I’ve found it helps until I can get Azo).
But as far as seeing a doc goes, I think you can wait til the morning. But do go in the morning.

Well she’s notn in extreme pain right now, only when she pees, which is weird, because she’s usually a baby (very low pain tolerance) could it be anything besides a UTI?

Yeah your only issue at this point, is her comfort. She probably feels like garbage and like the only comfortable place to be in the house, is the toilet.

Waiting is probably ok, unless she has the following symptoms: high fever, chills, sweats, back pain, nausea and vomiting. Those would be more worrisome for a severe infection (or something else). As uncomfortable as she is, she can wait until the AM.

@patg7590 Does she feel like she has to pee really bad, but then can’t?

I know you don’t have health insurance. I’m prone to UTI’s, and I have a primary care physician that tries to accommodate that. (when I didn’t have insurance) If you are close to a doctor, they may do the urine test for a UTI and not send it out to a lab. Labwork is the most expensive part of seeing a primary care doctor. If it comes up positive for a UTI, or even negative, they can write you a prescription for an antibiotic. That’s what my doctor did for me on multiple occasions.

I personally can’t stand the terrible pain of a UTI so I would do all I could to get on antibiotics, because it can turn into a kidney infection which you do NOT want.
And yes, get AZO. It takes the pain away.

@likeradar no, but if she did, it would be an enlarged prostate no?
but seriously I guess she was having that earlier, it’s not as bad right now.

Actually, the test for this is ridiculously simple. They just stick a test strip in a urine sample and get a reading right away. So it’s definitely something that can be done in a walk-in clinic (urgent care), and those tend to be a lot cheaper than a regular doctor visit or a trip to the ER. I’ve also found that if you tell them you don’t have insurance, a lot of doctors will work with you to find the most inexpensive route.

Thanks so much everyone! Lurve to all! Don’t know what I’d do without Fluther. Goooodnight

@MissAnthrope That’s the simple way, but sometimes that comes up as negative even when someone has an infection…that’s why they send the culture away to a lab for thorough testing. But, you are right, most doctors are willing to help out uninsured.

@MissAnthrope Not all tests are that simple. The rapid test is a simple strip, but the more sophisticated ones involve a person looking under the microscope at the urine ± culturing the urine to determine the precise cause of the infection and which antibiotic is best.

And even then they can’t figure it out [/bitter patient]

Aaah.. I see.

I dunno, I usually drink the cranberry if I have one and it helps…so who knows? And @casheroo is right…the last thing you want is for it to turn into a kidney infection. I had one once and it felt like someone was punching me in the kidneys…it’s pretty painful.

What you don’t want to do is use the AZO to postpone getting effective treatment longer than overnight. It works directly on the bladder lining to relieve pain, and comes with instructions not to use more than 48 hours. It can be tempting to keep taking it to avoid the expense of medical care, but as @shilolo and @casheroo said, she’s risking a kidney infection if she doesn’t get on antibiotics before too long.

One more thing – try not to take the AZO within 4 hours or so before going to the clinic to be checked out. It temporarily turns the urine a bright orange, which is not a big deal, except it makes those quick and easy urine test strips almost impossible to read – they’re dependent on seeing color changes that can be totally obscured.

so, it doesn’t hurt when she ees anymore, it was just for half a day when it did.

should she still go see a doc?

Oh yes… Don’t let that fool you, if it is a UTI, it hasn’t gone away. The bladder infection I had that went to my kidneys happened just like that. I thought it had gone away because the burning stopped, instead it just moved up my urinary tract to my kidneys and became very serious. I was in so much pain in the ER they gave me a Demerol IV in addition to an IV super antibiotic.

It’s so weird that it wasn’t as bad as everyone’s experiences here and only lasted for 6–8 hours…
Could it have been something else? Was i wrong to assume UTI? (She woke up with a pretty bad cold, but no pee pain)

@patg7590 Mine are like that. I actually like I have IC or something. I’ll have severe pain for a day or two, then get the meds but already feel better. It’s usually best to take the meds because UTI’s can be tricky.

Well…
IC interstitial cystitis which @casheroo mentioned, can cause symptoms identical to a bladder infection, without any bacteria involved. Certain foods and drinks can bring on IC symptoms, especially acidic foods, spicy foods, caffeine and artificial sweeteners.

Passing a small stone can also cause UTI symtoms – a larger stone will cause flank pain and obvious blood in the urine as well as the burning and urgency. Once the stone is passed, symptoms subside.

Antibiotics can be miracle drugs, but they are not without risk. There’s always the possibility of an allergic reaction, even with an antibiotic you’ve taken before. Antibiotics also wipe out friendly bacteria along with the bad ones.

I have seen women recover from mild UTI symptoms through pushing fluids and using cranberry concentrate – if that’s what she’s been doing, I would keep it up for another couple days and stay alert for any return of symptoms. Get seen ASAP if symptoms come back.

If she’s been using the AZO, don’t trust the symptom relief – it’s not a treatment for infection, only for pain. Go get checked out.

I’m no doctor, but a quick lookup of other causes of urinary pain basically tells me that she should get checked out. If it’s a UTI, it’s being sneaky and doesn’t mean it’s gone. I don’t think it’s related to the cold.. other things listed for urinary pain are STDs, vaginal infections, urethral conditions, that sort of thing.

She says it only hurts a little now, and subsides as soon as she wipes, (this is getting pretty graphic), points to infection or no? What about sensitivity like a small cut or something plus urine that has been influenced by some weird food or something?

@patg7590 Lady bits are pretty important parts of an anatomy- go to Planned Parenthood or another clinic and let a professional tell you if it’s a UTI, something else, or nothing at all.

So is the burning internal/achy, like somewhere up near the pubic bone, or external/stingy when the urine hits the skin? If it’s external, possibly a yeast infection or skin irritation from rougher than usual sex or an allergic reaction to something her skin is coming in contact with.

@MagsRags definitely the second one-external/stingy when the urine hits the skin

is there test for yeast infections? it could be the second one ,or what types of things could “allergic reaction to something her skin is coming in contact with.”

I think they sell yeast infection test strips now.. probably can find it at a drug store, Wal-Mart, etc.