Giving the Doucge
flexed. Lower the top covers to the feet, covering the patient with sheet or bath
blanket. Raise the hips and place the douche-pan beneath, putting a folded bath towel on the back edge of the pan to make it more comfortable. The bag containing the solution should be secured twenty to twenty-four inches above the patient. The external parts should be washed if there is any discharge.
The hands now should be well washed with hot water and soap, rinsed and dried on a thoroughly clean towel. The sterile, lubricated nozzle is held over the douche^pan and the water allowed to flow gently until the nozzle is warm. Hold the nozzle near the external parts, then insert it into the vagina, somewhat downward and backward, about four inches and allow the water to flow in a slow steady stream. Turn the nozzle round and round so that all parts of the vagina will be cleansed.
Remove the tube before the solution is entirely exhausted, first closing the stop-cock. Leave the patient on the pan for a few moments, then dry the vulva with cotton or gauze. Re-move the pan carefully so as not to spill any of the contents, dry the patient’s back, pull down the gown, draw up the covers, arrange the pillows and let her rest.
FOMENTATIONS, COMPRESSES, PACKS, ETC.—In the section on Water and Health (Vol. VI, Sec. 2.) are directions for ap¬plying these treatments. There is practically no difference in applying them to a -bedfast patient, as they have to be given in any case with the patient recumbent. In all cases care must be taken to make as little exposure of the patient as possible, usu¬ally all parts but those to which the application is made being covered with sheet or blanket or entire upper bedclothes. In summer, or when the room temperature is at summer heat, and with a member of the family, there need not be the extreme care to keep the patient fully covered, or to prevent all ex¬posure of the body, that should be taken under other condi¬tions.