No bladder control

[byrdsis]

My brother has had many uti's in the 4 months since his accident. He is on antibotics and has been for 2 weeks. The problem he has is that he is having many "accidents" where he urinates on himself. This bothers him alot, he does not want to go anywhere because he is scared he will have an "accident". He caths every 4-5 hours, he drinks very little if anything in the evening hours. He drinks water and sports drinks or fruit juice during the day. What else can he do? He complains about feeling bloated and feeling pressure in his lower stomach. He feels bad most of the time. He went to the ER and they did a cat scan and blood work, they did not find anything wrong. Does anyone have any suggestions as to what he can do or what the problem may be?

[wheels5894]

Hi! I think your brother is going to need some medical advice to get to be dry. You might start with http://www.spinal-injury.net/bladder-management-sci.htm which is a fact sheet that ought to help.

The thing is, does he have to cath or could he use a sheath and a leg bag. If his bladder empties and doesn't leave much residual urine, this would be a good way of dealing with leaks. Howver, it does involve a leg bag and some people apparently don't like them - I have one on now and I can't feel it so it doesn't bother me.

Another simple solution might be for the doctor to give him a drug to dampen down the bladder giving more time to use a cath.

Finally there is the solution I have. I have a catheter inserted into my abdomen (initially under anaesthetic) called a supra-pubic catheter (SPC) which drains the bladder well and is much better for infections that the intermittant catherisation your brother is using now. As long as one keeps drinking, the catheter can sty in place fro 10- 12 weeks and it is asim0ple job to change and you can learn to do it yourself. The only serious snag is the need to keep the lag bag attached all the time and connect a night bag to it for over night.

You are going to have to talk to the doctor to work out what would work out best thig based on the bladder's function. Come back for more advice though.

[noahb]

initially, i had issues as well. uti's will cause the problems you're describing. if they persist after uti has cleared up talk to your doctor about drugs. ditropan has worked extremely well for me.