If you are a CDPAP caregiver, you may have to deal with incontinence. The good news is that there are many products designed to help you with this problem. Notably, you can choose these products based on cost, the amount of urine you lose, comfort, usability, durability, and how often your leakage occurs.
Read on as we take you through the importance of treating incontinence and the best products to help you deal with it. But first, let’s begin by understanding the meaning of urinary incontinence.
What is urinary incontinence?
Urinary incontinence is the loss of bladder control. It results in the involuntary passage of urine after sneezing, coughing, or laughing. It’s a common issue affecting several people, especially the elderly. Here are the types of urinary incontinence and their causes:
· Urge incontinence: It’s characterized by a sudden urge to urinate followed by an involuntary leak. Infections or neurological disorders usually cause it.
· Functional incontinence: It’s a physical or mental impairment characterized by not making it to the toilet. For instance, some conditions such as severe arthritis might hinder you from opening your pants quickly enough, leading to an involuntary leakage.
· Mixed incontinence: Sometimes, people can also suffer from different types of urinary incontinence. In most cases, mixed incontinence is a result of stress.
· Stress incontinence: This type is characterized by a leakage that happens when you exert pressure on your bladder. In most cases, it happens when you sneeze, laugh, cough, or lift heavy objects. This type of incontinence may also occur when you’re exercising.
· Overflow incontinence: It’s characterized by frequent dribbling of urine if you have issues with emptying your bladder completely.
Next, let’s look at the factors that increase your risk of urinary incontinence.
Who is at Risk for Urinary Incontinence?
Specific factors influence urinary incontinence. They include:
· Gender: Women are more likely to experience stress incontinence due to life events such as pregnancy, childbirth, and menopause. Pregnancy and childbirth may weaken your bladder, pelvic floor muscles, and urethra. This comes as a result of extra pressure exerted by your baby’s weight. Additionally, labor may damage your bladder control nerves leading to urinary incontinence.
Meanwhile, menopause causes the fluctuation of estrogen and other hormones. The dropping levels of estrogen can weaken your urethra, causing urinary incontinence.
On the other hand, men with prostate gland issues may experience overflow and urge incontinence.
· Age: Old age is another factor that causes incontinence. As you age, your bladder muscles tend to lose strength.
· Weight: Being overweight may increase pressure on your bladder, weakening it and the muscles surrounding it. As a result, it leads to an involuntary leak when you cough or sneeze.
· Diseases: Having a neurological disease or being diabetic may increase your chances of experiencing involuntary leaks.
· Smoking: Tobacco usage can also lead to urinary incontinence. Over time, many smokers develop a chronic cough, which might put pressure on the pelvic muscles, making them weak. This increases your chances of getting stress incontinence.
Read on to understand the complications that you can experience if you don’t treat urinary incontinence.
What happens if incontinence is left untreated?
If urinary incontinence is left untreated for long, it may lead to chronic complications. These complications include:
· Skin problems: Urinary incontinence exposes your skin to moisture for longer periods. As a result, you may develop infections, rashes, and sores on your skin. Urine bacteria bring about these sores, consequently weakening your skin’s protective barrier. This makes your skin more susceptible to dermatitis and inflammations that cause painful rashes and sores.
· Urinary tract infections: A UTI is caused by incomplete emptying of your bladder. It may result in kidney damage after some time.
· It affects your personal life: When you start experiencing urinary incontinence for the first time, you may fear leakage accidents in public. This can impact your mental health as well as physical wellbeing. It can also affect your productivity at work.
Given the effects of untreated urinary incontinence, how do you avoid these complications?
Ways You Can Prevent Urinary Incontinence
Here are some effective ways to prevent urinary incontinence:
Perform Pelvic Floor Exercises Regularly
Pelvic floor exercises can reduce involuntary leaks, but you should do them properly for successful results. Some great pelvic strengthening activities include kegel exercises and Pilates. Pilates makes your core muscles stronger, consequently reducing stress incontinence.
Note that it may take up to three months of pelvic floor exercises before you finally start seeing its results. You also want to avoid high-impact exercises as they may exert pressure on your pelvic floor. These include jogging, sit-ups, and aerobics.
Avoid Smoking
The main issue behind smoking is lung damage that may cause severe coughing. As stated earlier, coughing strains your pelvic floor muscles, which may lead to stress incontinence. You can consult your doctor to help you with your smoking problem.
Avoid Lifting Heavy Objects
Again, lifting heavy objects stresses your pelvic floor muscles. But if you have to lift something, let’s say a shopping bag or your child, ensure you tighten and hold your pelvic floor muscles while at it.
Cut the Excess Weight
Being at a healthy weight can greatly reduce stress incontinence. This is because excessive weight may weaken your pelvic floor muscles due to heavy, fatty tissues that exert pressure on your bladder. To achieve positive results, make sure you consult your doctor for the best way to lose weight and keep excess pounds off.
Treat Constipation as Soon as It Begins
Treating constipation reduces stress incontinence. This is because straining while pooping may weaken your pelvic floor muscles, worsening your stress incontinence. You can also change your diet while exercising for successful results. A doctor may advise you to take more fiber and change your sitting position while emptying your stomach.
Cut Down on Caffeine Intake
Note that caffeine may have a huge effect on your urinary incontinence problem. It irritates the bladder, making your incontinence worse. You can request a doctor to help you reduce caffeine intake gradually for better results.
Alternatively, you can switch caffeine consumption with decaffeinated drinks such as herbal teas, water, and fruit teas. Some caffeinated drinks to avoid include tea, energy drinks, fizzy drinks, and green tea.
Avoid Alcohol Consumption
Alcohol makes you frequently urinate since it’s a diuretic. Lowering your alcohol intake may greatly reduce your incontinence issue over time. Again, seek your doctor’s advice on how to stop alcohol consumption.
Take Six to Eight Glasses of Water Daily
Drinking plenty of water or any other healthy drink may reduce incontinence, too. Although many think that fluid intake may worsen their condition, lack of fluids in the body reduces your bladder capacity, worsening your incontinence problem. Additionally, failure to drink water may lead to constipation, which worsens stress incontinence.
Eat The Right Foods
Spicy and acidic food may irritate your bladder, worsening your involuntary leaks. Some of the foods to avoid include citrus fruits and curries.
You can combine the above strategies with urinary incontinence-focused materials to deal with your situation. Read on to discover some of these devices.
Best Products for Urinary Incontinence
Although urinary incontinence may be an uncomfortable condition to experience, you don’t have to worry about embarrassing yourself anymore. For that reason, we have reviewed some of the best products to help you deal with your problem.
1. Disposable Sheet Protector
A sheet protector can help keep your sheets dry. This is because it’s made of cotton and polyester, making it a great absorbent pad to place on top of your bedsheets. The strategy helps you reduce the number of sheets you have to wash due to involuntary leaks.
2. Adult Diapers
Adult diapers help you with incontinence, especially during the day. Note that they come in various sizes, meaning you can easily find the right ones for your needs. Even better, adult diapers are discreet and come with an adequate level of absorbency. As a result, these help you feel comfortable all day, whether at home or in public.
3. Protective Underwear
Also known as overnight underwear, protective underwear has a higher absorbency than regular daytime diapers. This is because they can hold more liquid. For that reason, we recommend them for night use since most older adults don’t like waking up at night to change a diaper.
4. Liners
If diapers or protective underwear aren’t really your style, you can also opt for disposable liners. Liners tend to be more discreet, as these can be fitted and secured inside most types of underwear.
Disposable liners can be a great choice for elderly individuals who have active lifestyles and often go out.
5. Disposable Mattress Protectors
Disposable mattress protectors are suitable for individuals who don’t like cleaning reusable mattress protectors. These protectors help protect your mattress from leakage since you put them underneath your regular sheets to cover the entire mattress.
All you need to do is put the protector on your mattress each night, then throw it away the following morning. The best thing about mattress protectors is that they are usually large enough to cover your entire sleeping area.
The Bottom Line
Using the above strategies means you must deal with new changes in your life. It is therefore important to be patient with yourself as well as your loved ones.
Also, remember that you are not the only person dealing with urinary incontinence. There are millions of people with this problem out there. Fortunately, there are many urinary incontinence devices that you can use to better deal with the effects of incontinence on your lifestyle.