The present invention relates generally to the field of personal health care, and more particularly, but not by way of limitation, to an improved douche arrangement which serves as a bidet alternative apparatus.
Social mores and customs have long influenced the design of equipment used by women to cleanse their genitals. In some European countries bidets, which by dictionary definition are stool like fixtures with running water that are straddled for washing the genitals, are prominently and permanently installed in bathrooms. In such areas bidets are considered no more offensive to the sight than toilets or urinals. In many areas of the United States, however, bidets have been considered as very offensive to the sight. Thus there are few homes in the United States having bathrooms with either plumbing or floor space provisions adequate for the installation of bidets. In such homes non-plumbed douche equipment is normally used as a bidet substitute.
Non-plumbed douche equipment, operated by trained professionals, can be readily used to deliver medicinal fluids to the internal body cavities of patients with the proper amount of pressure at a controlled rate of flow. Self-administered douching is more erratic and unpredictable. Conventional bidet fixtures perform the cleansing operation more effectively and more safely than douche equipment designed for self administrations because of the positive control for rate of flow and pressure of the cleansing fluid.