What are bladder control issues?
Bladder control issues (urinary incontinence) cause you to lose control of your bladder. The issues cause you to urinate (pee) or leak uncontrollably.
Your kidneys remove waste from your blood and make pee so your body can get rid of the waste. Pee travels through tubes of muscle called ureters (yer-it-ters) to your bladder.
Your bladder is a round, hollow organ in your pelvic area that holds your pee. It’s below your kidneys and behind your pelvis bone. It’s about the size of a grapefruit, and it expands as it fills with pee and shrinks when you go to the bathroom.
When you have to pee, muscles in the walls of your bladder contract (tighten), and a sphincter muscle that keeps pee inside your bladder relaxes. This allows pee to flow out of your bladder through a tube called a urethra (yer-ree-thruh) and eventually exit your body.
Bladder control problems happen when your bladder muscles contract more than usual or don’t contract at the same time. If your bladder muscles contract with excessive strength, they can over overpower your sphincter muscles. This results in pee exiting from the bladder, into your urethra and out of your body uncontrollably.
What are the different types of bladder control issues?
There are different types of bladder control issues, including:
Stress incontinence. Sudden stress (pressure) on your bladder causes stress incontinence. Common causes include coughing, sneezing, laughing, lifting and physical activity. Younger and middle-aged women and people assigned female at birth (AFAB) near or experiencing menopause are most likely to have stress incontinence.
Urge incontinence. Urge incontinence occurs when you have an urge to pee but can’t make it to the bathroom in time. Urge incontinence commonly affects people with diabetes, stroke, multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson disease.
Overflow incontinence. Overflow incontinence occurs when your bladder is full, and you can’t empty it completely. As a result, pee may constantly dribble because you have a full bladder but you can’t sense the need to use the bathroom. An enlarged prostate that blocks your urethra or a spinal cord injury may prevent you from being able to empty your bladder when you pee.
Functional incontinence. Conditions that prevent you from reaching the bathroom in time cause functional incontinence. Arthritis, injuries, neurological conditions, dementia and medications that cause grogginess (sedatives) may prevent you from moving quickly enough to the bathroom or communicating to others that you have to go to the bathroom.
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