Important info about the 3 kinds of incontinence

Sometimes you just gotta go. It seems that the older you get, the more often this happens. Here are the three kinds of urinary incontinence, and how you could deal with them.

• As many as 30 percent of people over 65 have one or more of the three forms of urinary incontinence.
• Although women are far more likely than men to experience incontinence, by age 80, the gender disparity disappears.
• Urinary incontinence can affect your entire quality of life. It can cause you to cut out activities and friends you love, and even change the way you feel about yourself.
• There are three main types: urge, stress, and overflow. You can have more than one at a time, which is called mixed incontinence.

• With this form of incontinence, you involuntarily leak urine when you laugh, run, sneeze, cough or otherwise exert yourself.
• This is by far the most common form in women because of its relation to childbirth.
• If the pelvic floor muscles become weak, stretched, or otherwise damaged during pregnancy or labor, stress incontinence often occurs.
• Men often experience incontinence after prostate surgery.

• This is the second most common form in men.
• Overflow incontinence occurs when something blocks the urethra, the tube leading from the bladder to the outside of the body.
• In men, the blockage is most often caused by an enlarged prostate, medically known as benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH).
• With BPH, your prostate pinches the urethra closed like a clothespin pinches a garden hose. Pressure builds until urine finally leaks out involuntarily.
• Don't be embarrassed about BPH. It's the most common health problem in men 60 and older.

• In this form of incontinence, the urge to go strikes as suddenly as a summer storm — and often with similar flooding.
• Urge incontinence can occur if you have a central nervous system condition like Alzheimer's or Parkinson's disease, or have had a stroke.
• It may also be related to increased sensitivity of your bladder muscles to a brain chemical called acetylcholine, which stimulates the bladder into action.
• Treatments include medication, surgery or behavioural therapies, like exercises and bladder retraining.
• Lifestyle and behaviour changes are more effective overall than the medical options, but they may take longer to work and require more effort on your part.
•   Lifestyle and behaviour changes may not provide a complete "cure."

There are excellent medical and lifestyle treatments for incontinence. The first step, however, is admitting you have a problem and contacting your healthcare professional.