For any elderly person, health is precious. For an elderly resident of a nursing home, health is vital. In a nursing facility, one health condition can lead to another, quickly eroding a patient’s quality of life. Urinary tract infections (UTIs) are a common among the elderly, afflicting fifty percent of men and women. Thirty percent of nursing home infections are urinary tract infections as well. To prevent this painful, persistent condition, sufferers will require a safe option that accomplishes more than regularly prescribed, semi-effective antibiotics.
UTI Prevention: Do Cranberries Work?
According to new research, published in the American Journal of Geriatrics, the preventative solution to repeated infection might lie with cranberries. Regular doses of cranberry concentrate supplements have been shown to help reduce 25 percent of bladder infections for high-risk nursing home residents. Over 20% of elderly persons studied did not develop any UTI’s at all when taking a cranberry capsule.
Over the years, cranberry products have been touted as helpful solutions to bladder and urinary tract ailments, with varying degrees of success. Products like cranberry juice or servings of the berries actually prove too tart or sour to stick with as a supplementary or dietary preventative solution, and therefore have little impact on infection. This success of a one-year study, centered on 928 people with an average age of 85 years, is directly related to cranberry capsules with a specific composition, using the entire fruit, and was compared to a placebo capsule.
UTI Prevention: What’s Wrong with Antibiotics?
Short term, antibiotics eradicate UTIs and restore normal bladder and kidney function. Unfortunately, elderly patient suffer recurrent urinary tract infections and repetitive use of antibiotics can lead to bacterial resistance. Cystitis (bladder infection) or pneumonia can quickly become acute and life threatening, if excessive use of antibiotics renders them ineffective against bacteria. According to the Dutch Institute of Rational Use of Medicine, 25,000 Europeans die annually from bacterial infections no longer treatable by routinely prescribed antibiotics.
Cranberry poses no resistance issues and studies show that the fruit capsules are a safe alternative to antibiotics for the elderly in an ongoing manner.
Read the full article here: New research: Cranberry concentrate reduces risk of urinary tract infections in elderly – Medical News Today
