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How Can Alkaline Water Affect Bladder Health?

Alkaline refers to the pH level of the water. The pH level measures how acidic or alkaline a substance is on a scale of 0-14. For example, lemon juice (pH 2) and vinegar (pH 3) are both very acidic, while baking soda (8-9 pH) and milk of magnesia (10-11 pH) are both very alkaline. At pH 8-9, alkaline water has a higher pH than regular drinking water, which is around 7. Alkaline water can have benefits such as:

  • Weight Loss
  • Better Hydration
  • Increased Athletic Performance
  • Increased Energy
  • Improved Clarity
  • Boosted Immune System
  • Promoted Healing and Longevity

There have been many studies that have found that alkaline water can be extremely effective in decreasing acid reflux by inactivating the enzyme pepsin. Alkaline water can also reduce the blood viscosity, allowing the blood to flow through the body with more ease after an intense workout.

Drinking more water, especially alkaline water, can help people who struggle with urinary incontinence. One source states,

“Drinking more water may actually help and does not exasperate the problem. Your body must have water to function properly and drinking less of it can irritate the bladder and increase urination frequency. Water is pure and your body uses it to flush out excess amounts of acid and bacteria. Sipping water all day long is a good habit that you can try to help your incontinence to improve.”

https://freedrinkingwater.com/water_health/incontinence-treatment-drinking-filtered-water.htm

Alkaline water can also accelerate the excretion of melamine, preventing the accumulation in the bladder that can cause stones. Low urine pH can indicate metabolic syndrome, manifesting in symptoms such as kidney stones, high cholesterol, unstable and high blood sugar, unstable and high blood pressure, weight problems, and more. Drinking alkaline water can keep you hydrated, increase the pH of your urine, and keep infection-causing bacteria low.

According to the National Association for Continence:

  • An estimated 12.2 million adults have urge incontinence
  • An estimated 17 million adults in the US have daily Urinary Incontinence, and a further 33 million also have the overlapping condition, Overactive Bladder
  • Approximately 1 out of 3 women over the age of 45, and 1 out of every 2 women over 65, have stress urinary incontinence, affecting 15 million women
  • OAB and UI are about twice as frequently occurring in women as in men.

At His Therapy Wellness Center, we want to help anyone suffering from urinary and bowel urgency and incontinence, and any other pelvic health issues. Please let us know how we can help improve your health concerns by giving us a call at 864-534-1780, emailing us at office@histherapy.net , or visiting resources on our website www.histherapy.net. We hope you have a blessed day!

Sources:

Stop Stress Incontinence!

Stress incontinence (involuntary urinary leakage) is a condition, usually in women, in which you involuntarily urinate when pressure in the abdomen increases. This involuntary leakage may occur while coughing, sneezing, jumping or running as a result of weakened or damaged muscles in the pelvic floor. A statistic from Phoenix Physical Therapy states, “Stress urinary incontinence, the most prevalent form of incontinence among women, affects an estimated 15 million adult women in the U.S.” (“Urinary Incontinence in Women Statistics” n.d.). Many active runners, boot camp members and active women struggle with this condition. Unfortunately, many think a little leaking is normal. A statistic from Phoenix Physical Therapy states, “On average, women wait 6.5 years from the first time they experience symptoms until they obtain a diagnosis for their bladder control problem(s).” People tend to think it will just go away. The problem is that it isn’t like a cold. It won’t go away, it will just escalate.
 
To help prevent stress incontinence healthcare professionals recommend these three basic things, avoid constipation, be careful lifting heavy objects, and exercise with care. These small changes can make a big difference for your pelvic muscles and bladder leakage. It is very important that those who suffer with stress incontinence see a physical therapist trained in pelvic floor therapy. A pelvic floor PT is trained to identify and treat musculoskeletal conditions such as stress incontinence.
 
Office treatments may include learning proper exercise techniques, biofeedback, and more to help prevent stress incontinence. Exercises and muscle training has been proven to work best with patients in order to prevent stress incontinence in place of estrogen therapy, drug therapy, or electrostimulations. Biofeedback machines are used to identify and control the pelvic muscles so people know how to control those muscles. All of these treatments help women learn to control their pelvic muscles and prevent stress incontinence. The American Physical Therapy Association states from a study that, “pelvic floor muscles training and bladder training resolved urinary incontinence in women, as compared to drug therapy, electrostimulation, medical devices, injectable bulking agents, and local estrogen therapy.” Kegel exercises and other exercises that include contracting, holding, and releasing the pelvic floor muscles are the most effective in preventing and treating stress incontinence. Don’t believe that as we get older or because of different conditions, we should learn to live with leakage and stress incontinence. 

Urinary Incontinence

Urinary incontinence (UI) is the inability to control urine. An estimated 13 million adults (men and women) of all ages suffer from UI. Dysfunctional voiding patterns and leakage also occur in children of all ages. There are four basic types of incontinence.

Stress incontinence is when urine leaks out when stress (pressure) is put on the bladder, for example when someone sneezes or coughs.

Another type of leakage is called urge incontinence which is sometimes known as “overactive bladder.” This leakage occurs when there is a strong urge to urinate occurs and someone is not able to make it in time to urinate.

The other type of incontinence is called overflow incontinence which occurs when the bladder does not empty normally and becomes very full. Then dribble occurs out of the bladder.

Finally mixed incontinence is also another form which means basically that someone suffers from more than one type of incontinence which are described above.

If you or someone you know is suffering from urinary incontinence, please know that there are options for treatment. You do not have to live everyday wearing depends pad and you can learn to gain the control you need to live an enjoyable life. Some options that people have are medication, surgery and pelvic floor physical therapy. After discussing these options with your doctor, you should make the best treatment for yourself.

In terms of pelvic floor therapy, it does help to teach people new ways to control their bladder and train those muscles that are involved in controlling and stopping the leakage. These are the pelvic floor muscles.    

Pelvic floor therapists can help patients with the following interventions:

1) Education on proper food and fluid intake
2) Retraining of voiding habits
3) Strengthening and muscle re-education of the pelvic floor muscles
4) Strengthening Core muscles 
5) Biofeedback used to help retrain the muscles
6) Electrical Stimulation
7) Proper postural control and body mechanics
8) Education on proper home program

Benefits of Physical Therapy
* Increased bladder control
*Increased bowel control
*Decreased pain or pressure
*Restore or improve function with : less pad usage, eliminate pad usage, improve sleep, decrease or eliminate accidents, improve ability to function in the community, decrease adult isolation

Please contact us at HisTherapy if you have any questions regarding pelvic floor PT and how it can help with bladder control. 864-534-1780 or Sabina@histherapy.net

What Does a PT Do for Urinary Incontinence

As many of you may know that a physical therapists can help people to exercises with weights to help with strengthening or they can teach someone how to use crutches after surgery to help them walk. But how can physical therapists help with bladder or bowel problems like incontinence?

The pelvic floor muscle is a skeletal muscle just like other muscles in our body and they respond to

the same training techniques. Some physical therapists have developed special skills in

training the pelvic floor muscles. These therapists are called pelvic floor therapists.

If someone wants to strengthen their biceps arm muscle they have to learn the correct

exercises. Then they perform the exercises with the correct difficulty (not too hard, not too

easy) for the correct duration of time (it takes 4 to 6 months to increase the size of a

muscle). Pelvic floor muscle training is the same. First you have to learn the correct

exercise. This is challenging as it is an inside muscle and sometimes hard to find. In

fact, 40% of people are doing the exercise wrong. The best way to tell if you are doing

the exercise correctly is by palpating inside the vagina or rectum. A trained physical

therapist can measure the muscle by palpating just inside the vagina or rectum and asking

you to squeeze. This usually not painful but gives a lot of information about the muscle

How big is the muscle?

 Can you feel the muscle?

 Is the muscle painful and tense? – it is very important to relax and this may be the primary reason exercises do not work.

 Can the muscle elevate and support the organs – especially important when the organs are sagging?

 Can the muscle squeeze tight – to stop urine leakage?

 Can you hold the contract – long enough to get to the bathroom?

 Does the belly muscle work with (or against) the pelvic muscle?

 Does the breathing work with the pelvic floor muscle?


All these things are helpful in developing the correct exercise program. In many cases

the exercises are difficult to learn and additional information is needed. EMG

biofeedback can help. This device allows you to see the muscle contraction just like the

EKG allows you to see the heart contraction. To monitor the pelvic floor muscle a sensor

is placed inside the rectum / vagina or stuck to the outside of the rectum. If the

contraction is strong the line goes up (and stays up). If the contraction is weak the line

does not go up very high and fall quickly. Seeing this can help you to activate the correct
muscles and keep them activated increasing the effect of the exercises.

A proper exercise program includes the answers these questions:

 How long to hold the contraction?

 How long to rest between? – rest is as important as hold

 How many to do at a time and how many times to do them in a day? – studies tell us that you must do more than 45 per day to get results

 What position should the exercises be done in?

 How do you breathe during the exercises?


If you want more information about this or any of our services please call us at 864-534-1780.

Preventing and Treating Stress Incontinence

Stress incontinence is a condition, usually in women, in which you involuntarily urinate when pressure in the abdomen increases suddenly, as in coughing or jumping. This tends to happen because the pelvic floor muscles have been weakened or damaged, causing the bladder to leak. The two biggest causes of stress incontinence are menopause and damage to the pudendal nerve. After menopause, women lose the added protection from estrogen that acts on the perineum by fluffing up the tissue. Additionally, in younger patients with leakage, it could be a bladder infection or excessive exercise causing the leakage. To help prevent stress incontinence, healthcare professionals recommend these three basic things, avoid constipation, be careful lifting heavy objects, and exercise with care. All of these small changes can make a big difference for your pelvic muscles and bladder leakage if you take the time to recognize them. Unfortunately, for many women while this is going on they think, “Oh, this is normal,” or are too embarrassed to say anything to their doctor, but this is no problem to push to the side. If the problem is more severe or has been going on longer, there are other treatments such as exercises, biofeedback, and electrical stimulation. All of these treatments help women learn to control their pelvic muscles and prevent stress incontinence. 

You Don’t Have to Live with Urinary Incontinence

What is Urinary Incontinence? 
Urinary incontinence is the loss of bladder control that causes urine leakage before you can reach a restroom. If you suffer from UI, you are not alone. Almost 25 million people suffer from UI and 75%-80% of those people are women. While millions of people have UI, there are many different seventies ranging from little leakage when you cough or sneeze to having strong, sudden urges. 

What Causes Urinary Incontinence?
There can be many causes for urinary incontinence, for example, obesity, pregnancy, bladder infection, weak pelvic floor muscles, constipation, medications, stress, smoking, caffeine intake, and hormonal changes associated with menopause. Some of these causes are easier to eliminate, while others  are more involuntary and must be treated. 

Do I have to Live with Urinary Incontinence? 
There are many ways to treat urinary incontinence, but treatments usually depends on the state of the patient and type of incontinence. Often there are combinations of treatments used to treat UI in order to see the greatest improvement. Some of these treatments include strengthening your pelvic floor muscles with Kegel exercises, biofeedback, and bladder retraining. 

Urinary Incontinence

Guess what… You don’t have to live with Urinary Incontinence!!!

What is Urinary Incontinence?
 Urinary Incontinence (UI) occurs when your lose bladder control and leak urine before you can go to the bathroom. If you have UI, you are not alone. Millions of women have UI.
What causes Urinary Incontinence?
    
There are many causes of UI. Some causes include: obesity, pregnancy, bladder infection, weak pelvic floor muscles, constipation, medications, stress, smoking, caffeine intake, and hormonal changes associated  with menopause.

Do I have to Live with UI? 
   
There are many ways to treat UI. Treatment depends on the type of incontinence and the severity of the problem. Often, a combination of treatments is used and most patients see a drastic improvement in their symptoms. Treatment can include strengthening your pelvic floor with bladder retraining, biofeedback and electrical stimulation of your pelvic floor muscles. Physical Therapy can help you overcome UI.

Medication Which May Contribute To Incontinence

Some Medications can cause a change in urinary function. It is important to know all of the medications you are taking, whether prescribed by a physician or purchased over the counter drugs. It is also a good idea to keep track of any changes in your urinary habits once you begin to take a new medication. Your Daily Voiding Diary will help you keep track of this information. Here are some bladder side effects from common medications: 

MEDICATION                                                                       BLADDER SIDE EFFECTS
Diuretics                                                                      Frequency, urgency

Sedative                                                                      Urinary leakage            
Alcoholic Beverages                                                   Less desire to use the toilet
Pain Relievers

Antihistamines
Anticholinergics                                                           Frequent urination
Over the Counter Cold Drugs                                      Weak flow of urine
Antipsychotics                                                             Leakage between voids
Antidepressants

Alpha adrenergic agonist                                           Urinary retention
         (Drugs used for stress Incontinent)                            Frequency, leakage
                                                                                            Weak flow of urine

Incontinence Fads and Fixes

Fad 
Drinking Less Water with Incontinence 
Many people with incontinence and leakage believe if they drink less water then they wont leakage, but that is far from the truth. Incontinence is leakage that occurs because of the loss of bladder control. This happens a lot in patients when they sneeze, cough, exercising, or exert any pressure to their bladder. When this happens, many patients believe they should drink less water to avoid the leakage, but it is actually the opposite of what you should do.
 
Fixes 
Drink More Water 
An easy way to help lessen leakage with incontinence is actually to drink more water instead of less. The body needs water to function and lessening water intake can actually irritate the bladder and make people feel the need to urinate more.

Could You Have Stress Incontinence?

Stress Incontinenece:

This condition may occur when the muscles around the urethra become weak.  Even small amounts of physical stress, including everyday activities such as coughing, laughing, sneezing, exercising, even walking briskly, can cause the release of urine.

The good news is that, in may cases, overactive bladder, or stress incontinence can be successfully managed with the help of a professional.  It is nothing to be embarrassed about!

Call us today if you have any questions, we are here to help!