Avoid Urinary Incontinence: Exercises for the Pelvic Muscles

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Don’t suffer in silence if you have a leaky bladder. Talk with your doctor. Urinary incontinence (UI) can be a sign of a serious medical condition, such as multiple sclerosis or Parkinson’s disease. Although some people need medication or surgery, many more improve with simple lifestyle changes.

For example, pelvic muscle exercises, such as Kegel exercises, may help restore control to weak muscles around your bladder. That may lead to improvement that tightens a leaky bladder, prevents embarrassment, and gives you peace of mind. Follow these instructions to tone up your pelvic muscles.

  1. Identify the pelvic muscles that need exercising. Do this by stopping and starting the flow of urine several times when using the toilet.
  2. Tighten the muscles a little at a time. Contract your muscles slowly, hold for a count of 10, and relax the muscles slowly.
  3. Repeat these exercises for the anal pelvic muscles. To find these mus¬cles, imagine you’re trying to hold back a bowel movement, without tensing your legs, stomach, or buttock muscles.
  4. Practice tightening all the pelvic muscles together, moving from back to front.
  5. Start by repeating each exercise five times, three to five times a day.
  6. Gradually work up to 20 or 30 repetitions.

Other Ways to Keep Your Bladder Healthy

Here are other ways you can do to keep your bladder healthy and disease-free:

  1. Maintain the right weight for your height. The heavier you weigh, the more pressure you put on your bladder. Thus, if you are overweight, start dieting and exercising to achieve just the righ weight.
  2. Take it easy with medications. There are a lot of medicines that can worsen UI, including diuretics and opioids. The best thing to do is talk to your doctor, and tell him your situation so he can prescribe the right medicine and dosage for you.
  3. Watch what you drink. Coffee, tea, beer, soda, and anything the contains caffeine and alcohol can affect your bladder activity and cause leakage.
  4. Stop smoking. Aside from being a primary cause of bladder cancer, it can also easily irritate your bladder.
  5. Drink lots of water. This will help clean any infection you have in your urinary tract. However, this will make pee a lot, so make sure that you go whenever you need to and do not hold it in.
  6. Do diagnostic tests preiodically. It must always be considered that you can acquire a disease without actually experiencing symptoms.

The Importance of Urinalysis

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One should not underestimate the value of diagnostic tests. Contrary to people’s excuses, undergoing the necessary diagnostic tests could actually save you more money. It must always be considered that you can acquire a disease without actually experiencing symptoms. And most of the time, when the disease manifests itself, either it’s too late or it’s much more expensive to treat.

One such vital diagnostic test is the urinalysis or the analysis of urine. The urinalysis is believed to be the oldest diagnostic test, being practiced even before the blood test. From the Archives of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, historians say that in 400 B.C., ancient healers used insects in analyzing a person’s urine.

The urinalysis is a simple yet important practical test which aids doctors in their diagnosis and provides lead to other medical conditions. It is useful in detecting certain metabolic and systemic diseases affecting the kidneys. A urine sample which is taken normally or with the aid of catheter is initially examined for physical characteristics like color, odor and transparency. Then, the sample will be microscopically examined to test for components like pus, parasitic organisms, casts, crystals, yeast cells, and white and red blood cells. A thin plastic strip called dipstick is used to test for the presence of sugar and protein and to measure the urine’s acidity.

Generally, urine should be clear and straw-colored with a slight odor. It should be free from protein, yeast cells, sugar, and other organisms. The presence of fibrous materials called casts implies a kidney disease, while the presence of parasites and yeast cells indicates contamination of the external genitalia. Red urine may indicate renal tumors, glomerulonephritis, or renal trauma. The presence of proteinuria, on the other hand, may mean kidney inflammation. A burnt sugar odor is a symptom of Maple Syrup Urine Disease, while a sugary and fruity odor may indicate Diabetes Mellitus. Turbid or cloudy urine with a foul-smelling odor may mean a Urinary Tract Infection (UTI).

These are only a few of serious diseases that can be detected by a urinalysis.

Diagnostic tests serve as windows to the inner body. Remember, early detection is the key to a more effective and cheaper cure. So take the test…and pass it!

Chiropractors Reveal 3 Secrets in Warding Off Headaches

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Whether you are feeling a migraine or a throbbing pain, headaches can be difficult and really inconvenient. Chiropractors, who deal with a lot of patients complaining about tension headaches, therefore, share some secrets on how to effectively manage headaches so that they won’t last for hours.

Here are the top three steps on warding off headaches according to reliable chiropractors:

Sleep it off.

There is nothing a good sleep can’t cure, and this includes headaches and migraines. When you feel pain in your head, chances are there is a particular part or organ of your body that is not functioning well. And you can easily cure it by shutting off and resetting your body.

If you have the venue and opportunity when your headache attacks, such as you are simply in your house, for example, just lay your head down and get sufficient rest. If it is night time, sleep it off until the morning. If it is in the afternoon, make sure to get long, uninterrupted nap. When you wake up, you’ll feel way much better and your headache will magically disappear.

If, however, you are outside or at work when your headache manifests, find a way to go home immediately so that you can rest. Napping for a few minutes in the car or at your desk at work may only worsen the pain.

Drink lots of water.

In many cases, headaches occur when the body loses its water supply. Since our body is made up of 70-80% water, we need to maintain this volume every time. However, as we sneeze, pee, sweat, cry, and talk, the level of water in our body decreases. When it is not properly replenished, our blood gets thicker and concentrated, making it difficult to flow throughout the body. And by law of gravity, the brain may move from its original position, causing the excruciating pain in the head. Thus, drinking at least 8 glasses of water every day is essential to replace the water that we excrete from the body.

Engage in a quick exercise.

Some may hesitate about this advice and wonder how one can do some exercises when there is pain in the head. Remember that the common headache normally begins in the shoulders and neck and ends like a tight band squeezing the head. If this is how you experience headache, it means that the type of pain you are having is tense and stressed.

Before it even reaches the top of your head, you can stop it from maturing through a simple neck exercise. This is how you do it. Drop your head forward (like doing a bow) and simply allow your neck muscles to relax. To ensure that you have the right position, your chin should be resting on the top of your chest. Stay like this for two minutes, then rest your hands on top of your head. Apply more pressure and increase the stretch by letting your arms hang down loosely.

While there are a lot of medications and pain killers for headaches, as well as essential oils, herbal teas, and other remedies, by following these top strategies, you can say goodbye to headache in no time.