水疱 vs 火脹れ vs 水脹れ vs 肉刺


While hitchhiking from Tokyo to Sapporo in the past couple of days I devloped
a few blisters on the soles of my feet. I like to learn my vocabulary based on
my experience so looked up "blister" but found several words and no way to
choose between them:

  * すいほう (水疱)
  * みずぶくれ (水脹れ, 水膨れ, 水ぶくれ)
  * ひぶくれ (火脹れ, 火膨れ, 火ぶくれ)
  * まめ (肉刺)

I'm assuming the first, 水疱, is a borrowing from Chinese.

The next two appear to be native Japanese terms and each have several variant
spellings but share one orthogonal difference, one based on water 水 and the
other on fire 火.

The final one I learned only a day or so after originally asking this
question.

Could the first term be a general one for all kinds of blisters? What of the
next two, I can imagine that some kinds of blisters are caused by burns, but
what of the 水 words?

Are they for different kinds of blisters? Which is correct for the kinds of
blisters I have?

Since I'm asking, which of the spelling variants should I use when writing
these terms?




Using まめ is correct in the context of getting a blister on your sole.

水疱 and 水ぶくれ have same meaning, but the former one is academic term.  
火ぶくれ is only used for it caused by burns.

