With age comes wisdom and also comes an increased chance of injury. The chance of developing urinary incontinence increases as a women crests sixty. Urge incontinence, in particular, will occur in up to 40% of women in this age group. Since urge incontinence in women manifests itself as a sudden spasm of the bladder accompanied by an urgent need to urinate, it is credited with increasing the incidence of falls resulting in injury in this same segment of the population.
Falling is problematic in the elderly anyway. Add to this predisposition for injury an affliction whose symptoms causes a woman to rush to the bathroom to avoid having an accident, and you have a recipe for disaster. By the age of 65 every third woman can expect some sort of injury from a fall. The most prevalent cause of hospital trauma admissions, fracturing a bone in a fall, is frequently the beginning of the end for an older woman. This one mishap can change their lives permanently. Consider an older woman falling and fracturing her hip, preventing her from being able to live on her own ever again.
When you consider the symptoms of urge incontinence in this light, these symptoms take on an ominous tone. An overpowering urgency to get to the restroom to avoid having an accident can lead to a careless and life changing accident when urgency overrides safety. This hurried compulsion to get to the bathroom immediately opens an older woman up for slipping, tripping and falling, especially when rushing to the bathroom at night. Over half of these treacherous falls happen in the safety of a woman’s own home.
By identifying the cause of the urge incontinence and remedying the situation, there is a good chance that a woman can avoid falling and suffering a debilitating fracture. Unfortunately many women do not discuss their incontinence problems with their doctor, so they never even seek treatment. Sometimes embarrassment is the cause for this omission, and other times an older woman simply assumes that the incontinence is just a normal side effect of ageing and nothing can be done about it. Depending on the cause of urge incontinence in women there are a number of different ways to go about treating it ranging from biofeedback to medication to surgery.
In studies that measure the relationship between the increase in harmful falls among women suffering from incontinence versus women who are not suffering from incontinence, the former group were about 25% more likely to take a spill. Urge incontinence poses the greatest risk for an elderly woman falling, while there was not increased risk for women suffering from stress incontinence. Of the group of women that do take a tumble, about a third of them will suffer a fracture.
Falling is already a serious health issue for elderly women, and urge incontinence in women just exacerbates the situation. So if you or a loved one over the age of 65 are suffering from urge incontinence marked by a sudden and urgent need to urinate, discuss the problem with your doctor, and together you can come up with a cure or a safe management solution for your problem. Using good quality incontinence products or adding a bedside commode next to the bed can help mitigate the chances of falling and sustaining serious injury. Removing the urgency from urge incontinence, helps keep elderly women healthy and safe even if the situation is chronic.
Further Urge Incontinence Articles
- Just Can't Wait - All About Urge Incontinence
- Frequent Causes of Urge Incontinence in Men
- Urge Incontinence in Women Increases the Chance of Injury
- What is Urge Incontinence?
- Mental Health Related to Bladder Problems in Women
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