Like many other diseases, the lack of knowledge of microbial organisms limited how doctors, or the culture's equivalent, could treat them. Most cures largely focused on alleviating the symptoms, which centered around bed rest, washing, and herbal medicine. The Romans actually advocated surgical lithotomy in some cases. As the 18th and 19th century concept of hospitals developed, UTI's were better described, and treatments became more specific. Diet, narcotics, bleeding, surgery for stones, and douches were all used, but these again were designed to alleviate the symptoms.

PubMed Abstract: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15592018 Full Article: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022534705607604?np=y (note: this goes into great depth of what early cultures thought UTIs were.

EDIT: Adding more historical urology fun facts. Avicenna, an important Mid Eastern physician (980 to 1037) advocated melon seeds and centipedes to make the urethra more slippery during kidney stone passage. To answer you bladder question, yes they sometimes did. Bernard de Gordon wrote about bladder diseases in the 13th century, where he prescribed enemas and bleeding for these instances. Some physicians recognized the need for preventative care. William of Salicet (13th century) promoted washing your penis after intercourse.

E2: Clarification on kidney stone comment

UTIs don't seem to be something that go away on their own

Not an answer to the historical aspect but just wanted to clarify this; they usually do go away even without antibiotics actually, antibiotics are used mostly to shorten the time of the infection and ease the symtoms. I'm a nurse and midwife in Sweden and if there aren't any other factors (pregnancy, other illness, recurrent UTIs etc) that indicates immediate treatment with antibiotics women here are advised to just wait a few days and drink a lot of water. So I can imagine that even if women didn't have antibiotics back then the infections usually cleared up anyway but took a bit longer to go away.

I won't pretend to answer for other periods, but I have recently come across a couple of old medical textbooks from around 1920. These aren't necessarily specific to women's UTIs, but they might provide some insight into what was done when we had some medical knowledge but no antibiotics.

Preventative Medicine and Hygiene (1918): Venereal Prophylaxis and Sex Hygiene; Medical Prophylaxis

In the United States Navy the following method is employed: The entire penis is scrubbed with liquid soap and water for several minutes, and then washed well with a solution of mercuric bichloride, 1 to 2,000 in strength. If there are any abrasions present, they are sprayed with hydrogen peroxid [sic] from a hand atomizer. The man is then placed in a sitting position, well forward in a chair in front of a convenient receptacle, and given two injections of a 10 percent solution of argyrol. He is required to retain each injection in the urethra for five minutes. After taking the injections, the entire penis is thoroughly anointed with a 33 per cent calomel ointment. He is told not to urinate for at least two hours, and to allow the ointment to remain on the penis for some hours.

Treatment of Acute Infectious Diseases (1927). Regarding treatment of bacilluria (bacteria in urine) when present with typhoid fever:

It has been shown that a high degree of acidity, and especially an increasing content of organic acid, inhibit their growth. The effort should be made to eliminate them, as a prophylactic measure, for absence of local symptoms make the convalescent an innocent menace to the community. Hexamethylenamine (Urotropin) has been shown to have an astonishing effect on their growth, sometimes clearing up a turbid urine in a day or two. [...] When this does not clear up the bacilli, or a true cystitis prevails, bladder irrigations of silver nitrate, 1 to 5,000 daily, or a saturated solution of boric acid, should be instituted.

There's a couple sections in the Badianus Manuscript, compiled in 1552 and reflecting Aztec medico-herbal traditions (with some Euro introgression), which could fit the prescription. They deal generally with "pains of the groin" and "difficulty in urination," which are of course classic UTI symptoms.

The former symptom calls for grinding a type of pine with two other unidentified plants tlanen popoloua and "those that grow in a garden once burned over), along with sapote, brambles, and rushes together with a gizzard stone from a swallow. This should all be ground together with swallow and mouse blood and applied topically.

With the latter symptom a drink is prepared from flowers from leeks, an undentified Bourreria sp. (tlaco itzquixochitl), and magnolia blossoms. Also to be added are an unidentified root (mamaxtla), white and red earth, and ground up stone called eztetl. This should be drunk and oysters placed on the stomach.

For the urinary retention, i.e., when "the flow of urine is shut off," a different drink is prescribed. This one includes mamaxtla, the roots of Dorstenia contrajerva, rushes, and magnolia blossoms. This should all be ground together in acrid water with the "tail of a sucking puppy" and macerated chia seeds. An enema of sorrel root crushed in hot water could also be prescribed. Although if all "this medicine avails nothing" then i would be necessary to:

take the pith of an extremely slender palm, covered with thin cotton and smeared with honey and the crushed root of the herb huihuiztmallotic (unk.) , and this is cautiously inserted into the virile member.

And FYI, uncomplicated UTIs can and do resolve without antibiotics in healthy individuals. It's just that they do have the chance to progress to a more systemic infection leading to things like kidney failure and death.

As a follow-up, I remember reading that syphilis originated in the "new" world. How did Europeans and other cultures react to it once it spread back to the "old" world?

Dear OP,

For your reference, I asked this a while back. Here is the link so that you can read those answers as well.

http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1bqnkh/how_did_women_handle_infections_utis_yeast/

:)

I am also enjoying reading these responses too!