9 Smart Ways to Manage a Leaky Bladder

Worrying about having the urge to pee and not getting to the bathroom in time can be incredibly stressful. Fortunately, if you’re experiencing urinary incontinence, it is possible to go from leaky to leak-free. Here’s how.

By Katherine LeeMedically Reviewed by Igor Kagan, MD

Reviewed: May 27, 2023

Medically Reviewed

There’s no reason you have to live with the embarrassing inconvenience of a leaky bladder.

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Dealing with urinary incontinence — bladder leakage that you can’t control? You’re not alone. Bladder control problems affect millions of men and women of all ages, according to the Urology Care Foundation, with many of those people suffering in silence because they feel too shy, awkward, or downright embarrassed to talk about it with friends, family, and even their doctors. Truth is, there’s a lot you can do to decrease your risk of urinary incontinence episodes and avoid accidental leaks.

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Drink Enough Fluids to Keep Your Bladder Happy

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Drinking less water and other fluids to decrease your risk of an accident is not a good idea, says Tomas Griebling, MD, a professor of urology at the University of Kansas Medical Center in Kansas City. While it’s true that chugging down a lot of fluids — especially in a short amount of time — can lead to bladder leaks, not drinking enough can also make you need to pee suddenly.

“When you don’t drink enough water, the urine becomes more concentrated, and that can be irritating to the bladder and increase urgency,” explains Dr. Griebling.

How much fluid is enough varies from person to person, but the National Association for Continence (NAFC) estimates that six to eight 8-ounce (oz) glasses of water a day is about the right amount. Checking the color of your urine can help you know if you’re on target, according to Harvard Health Publishing. In general, a pale yellow color means you’re adequately hydrated, while a darker yellow suggests you need to drink more.

1975

Empty Your Bladder Regularly Even if It Doesn’t Feel Full

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Griebling says that going to the bathroom on a schedule, say, every two to three hours, even if you don’t feel the urge to urinate, is a good idea for people who have urinary incontinence or overactive bladder (a condition in which the bladder can spasm, causing an intense, sudden urge to urinate). Similarly, emptying your bladder before leaving the house or other venues, such as your office or a restaurant, even if you don’t feel an urge to go, can diminish leakage and prevent accidents.

1976

Plan Ahead: Scope Out Bathrooms Before You Leave Home

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If you have urinary incontinence, it’s a good idea to know where the bathrooms are located at unfamiliar destinations, such as restaurants, museums, shopping centers, and parks. Try finding a map or directory ahead of time online.

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Gain Insight Into Your Condition With a Bladder Diary

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Keeping track of your bathroom habits with a bladder diary can reveal patterns and triggers that help your doctor pinpoint the cause of your incontinence, Griebling says. A few days before your doctor visit, begin writing down what you drink, what time you drink it, how many times you urinate, and when you have leaking-urine episodes. Include anything that may have led up to an accident, such as coughing, exercising, or a sense of urgency.

1978

Tighten Your Pelvic Floor With Kegel Exercises

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Kegels, or pelvic floor muscle exercises, can benefit both men and women who have urinary incontinence by strengthening the muscles that support the bladder. This, in turn, helps prevent urine leaks and the feeling of urgency that comes with overactive bladder. And Kegels couldn’t be easier to do: Per the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, simply squeeze or tighten your pelvic floor muscles — these are the same muscles you use to stop the flow of urine or passing gas — for a count of three, and then slowly relax them for a count of three. Kegels are so easy, you can do them anytime — even while sitting in your car at a stoplight or at your desk at work. Build up to doing one set of 10 to 15 squeezes, three times a day, and your bladder control should improve within six weeks.

1979

Destress Your Bladder by Losing a Little Weight

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You may be able to lower your risk of leaking urine by losing weight. Carrying extra weight, especially around your middle, puts stress and extra pressure on the pelvic floor muscles, which then can cause accidental urine leaks, note experts at The Simon Foundation for Continence. In a landmark study published in The New England Journal of Medicine, women who lost 17 pounds (lb) over six months reduced leaking episodes nearly 50 percent, while those who lost only 3 lb reduced leaking episodes by 28 percent.

1980

Cut Back on Bladder-Irritating Caffeine and Alcohol

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Certain foods and beverages might irritate the lining of your bladder, making you need to sprint to the bathroom more often to avoid peeing on yourself.  While every bladder irritant doesn’t affect every person, there are two top culprits: caffeine and alcohol. “Caffeine is bothersome for many people,” confirms Griebling. “Alcohol and caffeine are diuretics, and they can be irritating to the bladder. I encourage patients to limit caffeine and alcohol intake to help reduce the urgency they may feel.”

Along with alcohol and beverages with caffeine, such as coffee, tea, and cola, other potential bladder irritants, according to the Johns Hopkins Women’s Center for Pelvic Health, include:

• Apples and apple juice
• Artificial sweeteners
• Carbonated beverages
• Chili and spicy foods
• Chocolate
• Citrus fruit and juices
• Cranberries and cranberry juice
• Milk products
• Pineapple
• Sugar and honey
• Tomatoes
• Vinegar

You may want to try eliminating one or more of these potential triggers from your diet for two weeks, then reintroduce them one by one every few days to see if you notice a difference in your urge to pee, how often you need to go, or the number of leaks you experience.

1981

Quit Smoking to Help Keep Your Bladder Healthy

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People who have urinary incontinence should do what they can to stop smoking. “Studies have found that people who smoke are more prone to incontinence,” says urologist Yvonne Koch, MD, a board-certified urologist in private practice based in Miami. “Smoking damages the very small blood vessels in our bodies and causes tissue weakness,” she explains. Furthermore, smoking can lead to coughing, which can cause urine leakage by putting pressure on the pelvic floor muscles. Plus, cigarette smoking triples the risk of bladder cancer, an early sign of which may be the need to urinate often or the urge to urinate immediately, even when the bladder isn’t full, according to Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.

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Review Your Medications for Potential Troublemakers

Many medications can contribute to urinary incontinence, according to Harvard Health Publishing, including:

• Diuretics, such as furosemide (Lasix) and bumetanide (Bumex), which increase the production of urine by the kidneys.
• Muscle relaxants and sedatives, such as diazepam (Valium) and lorazepam (Ativan), which relax the urethra, increasing the need to pee. They also may make you less likely to notice when your bladder is full.
• Narcotics, such as morphine (OMS) and oxycodone (Oxycontin), which relax the bladder, causing it to retain urine. This increases the risk of “overflow incontinence” (leaking between bathroom visits) because it’s difficult for the bladder to empty completely.
• Antihistamines also relax the bladder.

If you suspect your prescription or over-the-counter medications may be causing or worsening your incontinence, gather them up and “bring as many of your medications as possible with you to the doctor,” Griebling advises. That way, your doctor can determine if any dosages should be changed, if you should stop taking some of them, or if there are alternative medications without this side effect.

Learn more in our Managing Urinary Incontinence Guide.

Editorial Sources and Fact-Checking

• What Is Urinary Incontinence? Urology Care Foundation.
• How Much Water Should You Drink When You Have Incontinence? National Association for Continence.
• Color, Odor Changes in Urine Usually — But Not Always — Harmless, Reports Harvard Women’s Health Watch. Harvard Health Publishing. June 1, 2010.
• Kegel Exercises. National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. November 2021.
• Obesity and Being Overweight. The Simon Foundation for Continence.
• Subak LL, Wing R, West DS, et al. Weight Loss to Treat Urinary Incontinence in Overweight and Obese Women. The New England Journal of Medicine. January 29, 2009.
• Bladder Irritants [PDF]. The Johns Hopkins Women’s Center for Pelvic Health.
• Bladder Cancer Signs and Symptoms. Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.
• Medications That Can Cause Urinary Incontinence. Harvard Health Publishing. August 28, 2019.

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Contaminated Food Can Cause Some UTIs. Here’s How to Reduce Risk.

Eat|Contaminated Meat is the Surprising Cause of Some U.T.I.s

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/27/well/eat/uti-e-coli-meat.html

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Certain strains of E. coli, a bacteria commonly associated with food poisoning, can lead to painful urinary infections.

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March 27, 2023

Scientists are pointing to a surprising cause of some urinary tract infections: E. coli bacteria in meat. A new study used statistical modeling to estimate that E. coli, commonly known as the bacteria behind many food-borne illnesses, may cause hundreds of thousands of U.T.I.s in the United States annually — likely a small fraction of overall U.T.I.s, but enough to intrigue, and in some cases concern, experts.

The new study looked at chicken, turkey and pork in particular, as previous studies suggested that these foods can become contaminated with the type of E. coli that could induce a U.T.I. Over the last two decades, scientists have increasingly viewed food as a potential source of infection; the new study highlights just how pervasive these food-borne U.T.I.s may be.

A U.T.I. occurs when bacteria enters the urethra and infects the urinary tract. Sometimes an infection develops because of poor hygiene (i.e., not wiping correctly) or from sex, and some people are more anatomically or genetically prone to develop an infection than others. U.T.I.s can be pernicious and painful. People may experience symptoms like discomfort when urinating or a frequent need to urinate; they may feel cramps, fatigue or a stinging sensation during sex. Some may have “urinary hesitancy,” said Dr. Monica Woll Rosen, an OB-GYN at the University of Michigan Medical School — the urge to urinate that doesn’t produce any urine. U.T.I.s occur in both men and women, but they are more common in women because females have shorter urethras.

The symptoms of a U.T. I. are likely to be the same no matter the source of the infection, Dr. Rosen said. While the vast majority of U.T.I. infections are mild and treatable, in rare cases U.T.I.s can be severe, and even fatal, which is why researchers are so motivated to track down their causes.

A food-borne U.T.I. starts the way most U.T.I.s do: when E. coli from the gut migrates from the anus to the urethra, said Lance B. Price, a professor of environmental and occupational health at George Washington University and one of the authors of the new study.

Most of us carry E. coli around in our guts most of the time, said Dr. James R. Johnson, an infectious disease professor and leading researcher on urinary tract infections at the University of Minnesota and an author of the study. E. coli can contaminate food, but humans and animals can also carry and transmit the bacteria to one another. For the most part, this bacteria won’t bother us; only specific E. coli strains have the capacity to colonize the urinary tract and cause U. T.I.s. “As long as they stay where they belong in the gut, everybody’s happy,” Dr. Johnson said. “It’s only when they get confused and go somewhere that they shouldn’t be that trouble can happen.”

Other foods, including plants, can potentially harbor the E. coli that causes U.T.I.s, but those strains seem to be more commonly found in meats than in other foods, Dr. Price said.

There’s no way to determine the source of a U.T.I. based on symptoms, although you’re far more likely to get infected from a nonfood source of E. coli than from food-borne E. coli, Dr. Johnson said. And other bacteria can also cause U.T.I.s.

The findings from this study don’t mean you should immediately change your eating habits, said Dr. Michelle Van Kuiken, a urologist at the University of California, San Francisco. “There’s not a one-to-one correlation” between eating meat and U.T.I.s., she said, adding that she sees plenty of patients with recurrent U.T.I.s who are vegetarians and vegans. But further research might illuminate how diet can impact the risk of infection.

The recent findings should remind people to double down on preventive measures when cooking meat, Dr. Price said. That means being mindful not just when you handle raw meat itself but also when you interact with the packaging — especially the potentially bacteria-laden juices in a raw chicken container, for example.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that people take basic steps to safely prepare food and prevent potential E. coli exposure, including washing hands before, during and after cooking; using separate cutting boards for raw meats and other items like produce; ensuring that meats are cooked to the appropriate temperature; and refrigerating foods properly.

While it may seem counterintuitive to associate kitchen hygiene with U.T.I. prevention, Dr. Johnson said that the emerging research on food-borne E. coli shows that taking these steps could potentially ward off infection, just the way urinating after sex, staying hydrated and properly wiping might.

“Most people don’t really understand how U.T.I.s happen,” he said. “They just happen.”

Dani Blum is a reporter for Well.

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The duration and severity of a runny nose can be influenced not only by drugs, but also by diet, scientists say.

First of all, during a runny nose, ENT doctors recommend giving up any dairy products. Casein and lactose in their composition increase the production of mucus in the body. It is also better to temporarily refrain from eating soy, since this product, like other protein-rich foods, also leads to excess mucus secretion. By the way, for the same reason, it is better to impose a weekly moratorium on nuts and seeds. Sweets are also prohibited. Excess sugar increases not only nasal congestion, but also a sore throat. Therefore, for some time, try to completely eliminate sweets from your diet. Like coffee, strong tea (especially sweet), as well as all other drinks with caffeine, the excess of which can also increase mucus secretion. What to do to make the runny nose go away faster? Eat liquid food and drink more clean water, which reduces the volume of mucus, makes it easier to flush out of the nose, and also helps to clear the airways. Water should not be cold or hot, but warm.

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90,000 causes, symptoms. diagnostics and treatment – health articles

11/10/2022

The main factor predisposing to the development of rhinitis can be considered hypothermia, which contributes to the violation of the body’s defense mechanisms and the activation of conditionally pathogenic microflora in the nasal cavity, nasopharynx and oral cavity. Another factor is the decrease in the body’s resistance due to acute or chronic diseases.

Warming, humidifying and filtering the inhaled air, the nasal cavity performs a protective function. The nasal cavity and bronchi are anatomically interconnected, covered with ciliated epithelium and equipped with an arsenal of innate and acquired defense mechanisms. Therefore, conditions that cause a runny nose can be a trigger for the development of a disease of the lower respiratory tract.

Causes

The most common causes of rhinitis are: environmental irritants such as dust, smog, smoking and secondhand smoke, and strong odors such as perfumes or cleaning products can cause non-allergic rhinitis. Chemical fumes to which some people are exposed at work may also be contributing factors to the development of rhinitis.

Fluctuations in temperature and/or humidity often cause a runny nose. Contrary to popular belief, the likelihood of inflammation of the nasal mucosa in cold weather is only slightly higher than in high air temperatures.

Among the most common causes of rhinitis are viral infections such as the common cold or the flu. Such rhinitis usually resolves within a few weeks, but in some cases it can become chronic, causing a persistent, usually mild, runny nose.

Some foods and drinks, especially very hot and/or spicy foods, can cause rhinitis directly or indirectly. Drinking alcoholic beverages can also cause nasal congestion or a runny nose.

Some drugs can trigger non-allergic rhinitis. These include non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, drugs for hypertension, such as beta-blockers. In some people, rhinitis is caused by sedatives, antidepressants, oral contraceptives, or medications used to treat erectile dysfunction.

Sometimes rhinitis is caused by the abuse of nasal drops. Changes in hormonal levels, such as during pregnancy, during menstruation, and in certain diseases, are another possible cause of rhinitis. Emotional and/or physical stress can also cause rhinitis in some cases.

Symptoms

Acute coryza affects both halves of the nose. In the development of inflammatory local changes in the mucous membrane of the nasal cavity, 3 stages are distinguished:

• stage of irritation: dryness and stuffiness of the nose, swelling and hyperemia of the mucous membrane, especially in the area of ​​the turbinates;
• serous stage: a sharp violation of nasal breathing, abundant mucous discharge from the nose, sneezing, lacrimation, conjunctivitis;
• stage of mucopurulent discharge is characterized by improvement in nasal breathing: mucopurulent discharge gradually decreases, recovery occurs in 7-8 days.

The disease develops acutely, manifested by chills, malaise, headache, sneezing and obsessive cough, decreased sense of smell, changes in taste and timbre of the voice, nasal, hearing loss, lacrimation and conjunctivitis.

On palpation, there may be local pain in the forehead and bridge of the nose.

Often, nasopharyngitis is complicated by tracheobronchitis, bronchopneumonia, otitis media, stomatitis, ethmoiditis, dacryocystitis, dermatitis of the vestibule of the nose and nasolabial region, rarely – pharyngeal abscess.

Diagnosis

Diagnosis of acute rhinitis is not difficult, and includes asking the patient about his complaints, how much time has passed since the onset of the first symptoms. If you carefully follow the chain of symptoms of the disease with the order of their appearance, you can easily determine at what stage of development the inflammatory process in the nasal cavity is.

The final diagnosis is made after a special examination by an otolaryngologist (ENT doctor). The doctor examines the nasal cavity using a special device called a light reflector, which reflects light from a light bulb and directs it into the nasal cavity being examined.

With rhinitis at an early stage of development, redness and swelling of the mucous membrane is usually noticeable. In the future, purulent discharge appears.

Treatment

Therapeutic therapy with traditional methods is based on the use of pharmacological preparations, which are indispensable for certain types of rhinitis. First of all, we are talking about antiseptic and antibacterial drugs. With the help of some of them, it is possible, for example, to get rid of sinusitis without a puncture (puncture). During an allergic rhinitis, antihistamines and local hormonal drugs and so on are used.

In addition to drug therapy, phytotherapy, reflexology, breathing exercises, and aromatherapy are used. Herbal medicine involves the use of herbal remedies, as well as infusions and herbal decoctions.