Urinary incontinence during confinement

After giving birth, a pregnant woman's uterus needs a month to recuperate and slowly recover. This period is called confinement. After a woman gives birth, her vagina will be enlarged, which is likely to involve the urethra or bladder. Therefore, most women will experience urinary incontinence during the confinement period. Of course, this phenomenon will gradually improve as the uterus slowly recovers. Let’s take a look at what causes urinary incontinence during the confinement period.

1. Urge urinary incontinence

This type of incontinence includes bladder instability, detrusor hyperreflexia, bladder spasm, and neurogenic bladder (uninhibited bladder), where incontinence is related to uncontrolled detrusor contractions.

2. Stress urinary incontinence

Involuntary urine leakage occurs when the intra-abdominal pressure rises sharply during body movements such as coughing, sneezing, jolts or lifting heavy objects. Urinary incontinence occurs when the intra-bladder pressure rises above the urethral resistance without detrusor contraction. The defect in stress urinary incontinence is in the bladder outlet tract (sphincteric insufficiency), resulting in insufficient urethral resistance to prevent urine leakage.

3. Overflow incontinence

Overflow incontinence occurs when the pressure of a chronically filled bladder exceeds urethral resistance. The cause may be a tone-less (uncontractable) bladder or functional or mechanical obstruction of the bladder outlet tract. A tone-less bladder is often caused by spinal cord trauma or diabetes. Bladder outlet obstruction in elderly patients is often caused by fecal impaction. About 50% of patients with constipation have urinary incontinence. Other causes of outlet obstruction include prostate hyperplasia, prostate cancer, and bladder sphincter dysfunction. Some individual cases are caused by psychogenic urinary retention.

4. Functional urinary incontinence

The patient can feel that the bladder is full, but due to physical movement, mental state and environmental reasons, he cannot help but urinate or urinate intentionally.

Urinary incontinence in the elderly means that urine in the bladder cannot be controlled and flows out on its own. Urinary incontinence can occur in patients of all age groups, but it is more common in the elderly. Because urinary incontinence is more common in the elderly, people mistakenly believe that urinary incontinence is an inevitable natural consequence of the aging process. In fact, there are many reasons for urinary incontinence in the elderly. We should look for various reasons and adopt reasonable treatment methods.

1. Central nervous system diseases

Such as neurogenic bladder caused by cerebrovascular accident, brain atrophy, brain and spinal cord tumors, lateral sclerosis, etc.

2. Surgery

Such as prostatectomy, bladder neck surgery, radical resection of rectal cancer, radical resection of cervical cancer, abdominal aortic aneurysm surgery, etc., which damage the motor or sensory nerves of the bladder and sphincter.

3. Urinary retention

Urinary retention caused by prostatic hyperplasia, bladder neck contracture, urethral stenosis, etc.

4. Unstable bladder

Unstable bladder is caused by bladder tumors, stones, inflammation, foreign bodies, etc.

5. Women after menopause

Estrogen deficiency causes loss of tone in the urethral wall and pelvic floor muscles.

6. Delivery Injury

Weak sphincter caused by uterine prolapse, cystocele, etc. Function reduction

1. Positive attitude Take a positive attitude, face the problem, don’t avoid it, and seek medical treatment as soon as possible to find the cause. Learn how to deal with negative emotions. Remind yourself that incontinence is a health problem and not something wrong or shameful.

2. Pelvic floor muscle training can strengthen the contraction and control of the pelvic floor muscles through exercise, prevent urine from leaking out, and improve incontinence. If you want to know how to train your pelvic floor muscles, you can consult your medical staff.

3. Drug treatments mainly include drugs for treating urinary tract infections and incontinence. They must be prescribed by a doctor according to the situation. Do not buy and use them at will.

4. Yam and turtle soup: 15 grams of yam, 10 grams of wolfberry, one turtle, and appropriate amounts of ginger, salt and rice wine. After slaughtering and cleaning the soft-shelled turtle, stew it with yam and wolfberry. When it is cooked, add ginger, salt and rice wine to season. Efficacy: Nourishes yin and kidney, replenishes qi and strengthens spleen. Suitable for patients with urinary incontinence due to yin deficiency and weak body.

5. Mutton and glutinous rice porridge: 50 grams of mutton, 100 grams of peas, 200 grams of glutinous rice, and appropriate amounts of salt, MSG and pepper. Wash the mutton, cut it into small pieces, add peas, rice and appropriate amount of water, bring to a boil over high heat, then simmer over low heat until cooked through, add salt, MSG and pepper to taste. Efficacy: Nourish the middle and replenish qi, prevent and treat urinary incontinence caused by weak qi.

6. Astragalus and black chicken soup: 50 grams of astragalus, a black chicken, and appropriate amounts of green onion, ginger, wine and salt. After the above ingredients are cooked, add green onions and salt to season. Efficacy: Nourishes the spleen and kidneys, suitable for patients with urinary incontinence due to long-term illness or the elderly. Adding japonica rice makes Astragalus and black chicken porridge, which has the same effects. Experimental studies have shown that Astragalus has estrogen-like effects and can effectively prevent and reduce urinary incontinence caused by estrogen deficiency in menopausal women.

7. Astragalus honey drink: 30 grams of astragalus, 10 grams of honey. Brew Astragalus with boiling water, let it cool, then add honey. Efficacy: Prevent and treat urinary incontinence in the elderly and weak, overflow urinary incontinence and urinary incontinence in elderly women.