In standard medicine, the most frequent uses of enemas are to relieve constipation and for bowel cleansing before a medical examination or procedure; also, they are employed as a lower gastrointestinal series (also called a barium enema),to treat traveller's diarrhea as a vehicle for the administration of food, water or medicine, as a stimulant to the general system, as a local application and, more rarely, as a means of reducing temperature as treatment for encopresis, and as a form of rehydration therapy (proctocolitis) in patients for whom intravenous therapy is not applicable