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How to Deal With Urinary Incontinence

Urinary incontinence means that a person involuntarily passes urine. While we have mostly known the aged to suffer from this problem, the condition can occur at any age and can be a bit too embarrassing. It can be mild with a slight leak during coughing or sneezing or the urge to pass the urine is so strong that a person cannot reach the toilet in time.

However, like all other conditions, this problem can also be managed effectively with the right treatment and lifestyle changes.

Let us understand the condition first.

The urinary system consists of kidneys, ureters, bladder, and the urethra. All these body parts work in tandem to produce urine and eventually let it flow out of the body. However, if any of them is dysfunctional, the process is disrupted and people leak out urine before they get to the bathroom. The disruption in the process can occur for many reasons depending on different causes and triggers. 

The different types of incontinence are:

• Urge Incontinence: This type of incontinence causes the person to pass urine immediately and not give enough time to reach the bathroom. The cause is an overactive bladder due to weak pelvic muscles, nerve damage, low levels of the hormone estrogen, infection, and obesity. Caffeine and alcohol can also cause urge continence.
• Stress continence: Here the leakage happens when a person sneezes, coughs runs, jumps, or lifts heavy things as they put pressure on the bladder. The cause is weakened pelvis muscles. Women after giving birth and men after prostrate surgery experience stress incontinence.
• Overflow incontinence: When the bladder doesn’t drain completely it causes a spill from time to time. This causes overflow incontinence. This occurs in people suffering from diabetes, stroke, or sclerosis.
• Mixed incontinence: This type of incontinence is a combination of many problems that lead to urine leakage like an overactive bladder, stress incontinence, etc.

How to deal with urinary incontinence

Urinary incontinence can be prevented from disrupting one’s life.

• Seek professional advice: Consulting a doctor may be the first step one can take to deal with urinary incontinence. The doctor inquires about symptoms and may conduct a pelvic examination. They may advise maintaining a diary to note the intake of fluid and the frequency of urination and suggest certain diagnostic tests.
• Medications: Medications that can decrease leakage. While some medicines stabilize the muscle contractions that cause an overactive bladder, other medications relax muscles to empty the bladder completely. Hormone replacement therapies can help restore normal bladder function.
• Lifestyle changes: Lifestyle modifications like losing excess weight, reducing the intake of alcohol, and caffeine, and doing pelvic floor exercises are advised. Some people are suggested to use absorbent pads and hand-held urinals to manage the uncontrolled passage of urine. Drinking too many liquids or fizzy drinks should be avoided before going to bed.
• Emptying bladder regularly: The bladder should be emptied at fixed timings instead of waiting for the urge to pee and also before any physical activities or while lifting heavy things.
• Surgery: Surgical procedures like the sling procedure which decreases the pressure on the bladder and strengthens the muscles that control urination are performed. Some surgeries enlarge the bladder or implant a device that activates the nerve that controls the detrusor (sphincter) muscles.
• Vaginal insert: These devices can be put in the vagina to compress the urethra and help decrease stress incontinence in women.
• Injections: Injecting bulking agents that increase the lining of the urethra or Botulinum to relax muscles of the bladder can help with urge incontinence.

Incontinence is embarrassing but that should not stop a person from talking about it to the doctor. Like any other condition if the cause of this problem is identified the condition can be managed providing a great amount of relief to the person allowing them to enjoy normalcy like before.