Healthepic-Types of sun bath

One can take this kind of sun bath when the heat is mild. Spread a bed-sheet on the ground and lie down on it, wearing minimum clothes for sometime, but covered with a thin dry cloth or shawl, till he gets well warmed.
Then take a wet cloth, wrung out nearly dry, or a green banana leaf or other leaves. Spread it over the body from the neck down to the knees, the face being kept in the shade, and the parts below the knees being covered with a dry cloth.
The patient may have regard to the principle of non-violence and begin with 15 minutes of sunbathing and gradually increasing it upto 40 minutes. After this the skin surface should be wiped clean with a nearly dry cloth and a trunk bath or a spinal bath should follow.

The Walking Sun Bath

An easy way of walking in warm sunshine at any time when the sun is rather hot with the head and upper parts of the body protected from the heat by a wet cloth, is an easy way of sun bathing in the open. This may be done when going to and returning from a plunge bath in a tank or river.

Hamsa Water

Sunlight can be used indirectly also by charging drinking water with it. The proper way is to expose the water to sunlight in a shallow and wide mouthed vessel, covered over with a plantain leaf or other green leaf. Over this may be placed thin porous cloth, secured on the sides so that the covering leaf is not blown away by the wind.

Water so treated is called Hamsodakam, Hamsa being one of the names of the sun. The water may be drunk in small doses at intervals the next day.

Steam Bath

In many Nature Cure institutions, full steam baths are given to most patients, to improve their powers of reaction and to enable their skin to eliminate the toxic matter quickly. Such baths are given even in summers and to very weak patients. A note of caution is to be made in this regard.

Local steam baths, where found necessary, may be taken in a convenient posture, sitting in a chair or on the floor, so that particular parts of the body are exposed to the hot vapour, the faces being kept open and the rest of the body being covered so as to confine the vapour. If the face needs to be steamed, as when there is a cold or a severe headache, the exposure must be very short. Immediately after such a local steam bath, it would be advisable for the patient to pack a wet cloth over the forehead and rest.

The Hot Foot Bath

A hot foot bath can be taken for a duration of 10-30 minutes, with the body well covered so as to promote sweating. It is a convenient and sufficient substitute for the steam bath.
It warms up the body producing a reasonable amount of perspiration. Thus it is a good preparation for a spinal bath or a hip bath.
The foot bath can be taken simultaneously with any of the cooling baths with great advantage. Such a combination is essential for patients with chilly extremities. They will find no difference in temperature between that part of the body which is placed in cold water and the rest of the body.

This bath is absolutely non-violent and can also be taken by weak patients by suitably adjusting the temperature of the hot water. It is remarkably helpful in relieving cold or heaviness of the head.

The feet must be dipped in hot water. (The patient should comfortably bear it). It will not be proper to prescribe any temperature, as it might possibly prove violent to some and insufficient to others. The decision must be left to the patient.
More hot water may have to be added as time passes and as the patient gets his lower extremity warmed up. Sipping cold water very slowly at intervals during the bath makes it more non-violent, and more advantageous. It would not be advisable to give hot foot baths to patients suffering from high blood pressure, heart trouble and kidney or liver disorders. In such cases if the feet of the patient happen to be cold, two hot water bottles (with a towel wrapped over them) may be placed on the bed on either side of the legs and a bed-sheet (or woollen sheet, if need be) may be used to cover the patient body (keeping the face exposed) to keep the bed warm.

Hot and Cold Fomentation

Normally, for the relief of pain, cooling of the affected part of the body by the application of a local wet pact should do.

Prepare hot water (as hot as may be conveniently bearable by the patient) in a wide vessel and have cold water (bearably cold but not ice-cold) in another wide-mouthed vessel .
Take two towels to a size suitable for fomentation over the affected area. Dip one that would produce a little friction over the skin.
Fold each of the towels to a size suitable fomentation over the affected area.
Dip one of the towels in hot water, rinse it fairly well and apply it over the affected area (preferably three or four inches above or below it). Keep it there for a minute applying a little gentle pressure over it by the hand.
Immediately thereafter, take the other towel (suitably folded, dipped in the cold water and rinsed fairly well) and apply it over the same area.