Whether you are postpartum, going through menopause, or just welcomed grandchildren into your family, Women of all ages can experience the frustrating symptoms of bladder or bowel leakage. Incontinence impacts your physical, emotional and sexual health—truly affecting your quality of life.
Attain is clinically proven effective at curing urge, stress, and bowel incontinence, and InControl Medical offers a Performance Guarantee.
Stress Incontinence: is the involuntary loss of urine associated with physical exertion or increased abdominal pressure. Women with stress incontinence experience leakage when laughing, coughing, sneezing or exercising.
Urge Incontinence: also known as overactive bladder (OAB) or detrusor instability which is that sudden, irresistible urge to use the restroom or getting up frequently during the night to urinate.
Mixed Incontinence: is when you have symptoms of both stress and urge incontinence.
Fecal Incontinence: Involuntary loss of bowel contents, also known as Accidental Bowel Leakage.
Tired of wearing costly pads or even diapers? No matter how much the advertisers try to normalize the use of pads or diapers and even try to make disposable underwear sexy or pretty—we know there is nothing sexy or pretty about wearing either option.
Pads are not a solution to bladder leakage, they are simply a temporary, inconvenient aggravation until you solve the underlying problem that causes your bladder leakage. Bladder leakage is not something that will get better with time and will likely get worse. Wearing a pad increases your chances of urinary tract infection, significantly.
Some may be concerned about the cost of solving your bladder leakage problem, however, treating the problem with Attain or Apex costs less than purchasing pads, diapers and other products over time. Studies have shown women with incontinence pay approximately $900 annually for routine care and management of incontinence; costs included pads, laundry/dry cleaning, etc.
Let’ Not Forget the Environment! It is estimated that is takes up to 500 years for disposable pads and diapers to decompose.
Many physicians recommend Pelvic Floor Exercises as a first line treatment for Stress and Urge bladder leakage. The goal of pelvic floor muscle training is to strengthen weak urinary sphincter and pelvic floor muscles – the muscles that control urination and defecation.
Pelvic floor muscle exercises are often referred to as “Kegel” exercises; named after the physician, Dr. Arnold Kegel, who popularized this technique.
How to Perform Kegel Exercises
Imagine attempting to stop the flow of urine or passing gas. When you perform this action you are contracting the muscles of the pelvic floor. It is extremely important that you are contracting these muscles in isolation and NOT using your abdominal, buttock or leg muscles.
The Problem with Kegel Exercises: INCORRECT TECHNIQUE
Kegel exercises, we have all heard of them and know that we should be doing them, but do we do them correctly? At the mention of “Kegel exercises” I envision all of us women performing our exercises at every stop light. Squeeze, relax, squeeze relax…. Do you ever wonder if they really work? Am I doing them correctly? How long should I squeeze? You might be surprised to know Kegel exercises or pelvic floor muscle contractions are all about proper technique!
Research has shown that over half of women who attempt Kegel exercises do them incorrectly by over-using their abdominal, buttock or leg muscles resulting in NO improvement in pelvic floor muscle strength–remember, you have to contract the correct muscles in isolation in order to be effective! Additionally, if you already have very weak pelvic floor muscles, you may not be able to contract them effectively.
According to Dr. Arnold Kegel—inventor of Kegel exercises, “Muscles that have lost tone, texture and function can be restored to use by active exercise against progressive resistance since muscles increase in strength in direct proportion to the demands placed upon them.” Simply put, you need to perform your exercises with active resistance—something to squeeze against.
Treatment of the pelvic floor is a specialized aspect of physical and occupational therapy. There are a wide range of issues that can arise from weakness in the muscles of the pelvic floor or around the organs inside the pelvis such as urinary frequency, urgency or problems with incontinence and interstitial cystitis.
Patients typically attend in-office appointments 2-3 times per week for a duration of 12 weeks. Treatment requires manual digital manipulation of the external and internal tissues of the pelvis, vagina and/or rectum. This type of therapy is fairly intimate and can be uncomfortable for some patients.
Therapists will often utilize bladder training, biofeedback, pelvic floor muscle exercises and electrical muscle stimulation within their practice, which makes Attain the perfect at home component to your long term pelvic health program.
Why Attain? It accelerates and maintains your results during and after completion of your pelvic floor therapy. Attain provides the at home component and allows you to continue with biofeedback, muscle stimulation and a visually guided exercise program to enhance and maintain your results.
Medications are available to treat your bladder leakage. As with any medication, there are side effects. Be sure to discuss with your care provider all potential side effects of the medication and be sure to share with your provider a list of all medications that you are currently taking.
Note: Medications do nothing to strengthen the pelvic floor muscles, the leading cause of incontinence.
Why Attain is better than Medication for treating Urgency/OAB
You have a choice to treat your overactive bladder. Which would you choose?
- Take a costly medication every day that studies have shown are effective in only one in five people, has side effects and most stop taking them in less than a year.
- Stop your OAB symptoms by solving the problem at the source naturally with Attain.
Attain stops overactive bladder or urgency urinary incontinence by calming the detrusor muscle that surrounds the bladder to prevent spasms, without medication and with no side effects.
OAB medication facts
- Only 20 percent of patients taking OAB medication receive any benefit
- Compliance with taking medication is low; 73 percent of people taking OAB medication discontinue them within one year
- Most common reason for discontinuing OAB medication is lack of effect
- Common side effects: dry mouth, constipation, fatigue, hypertension, headache
- Recent studies have shown that Anticholinergic Medications may increase dementia risk by 50%
- Medications are expensive, with some costing $10 per pill! Medication, even with copay as little as $35.00 per month, are more expensive than the cost of Attain in the first year
Neurotoxin (Botox®) is used for urge incontinence. Toxin is injected into the detrusor muscle (the muscle that surrounds the bladder) to limit the muscle’s ability to contract, thus diminishing the symptoms of urgency for a period of time. Injections must be completed with regularity, as the effects of the injection diminish.
How is Neurotoxin (Botox) Administered?
Neurotoxin (Botox) is injected into the muscle of the bladder. This procedure is done in an operating room or clinic. The bladder is flushed with a local anesthesia, via a catheter, which numbs the bladder. Then a scope is passed up the urethra (urine channel) into the bladder. A needle is placed through the scope and several injections are made into the bladder designed to spread Botox throughout the muscle of the bladder.
This procedure is typically required every 6 months and with any medication/procedure you need to be aware of side-effects. Botox does not treat Stress Urinary Incontinence, or strengthen the pelvic floor muscles.
Common Side Effects
Attain, which is a one-time cost, solves incontinence at the muscle level and has no adverse events associated with its use. Why mask the issue with the repeated use of medication when you can solve stress, urge / OAB and mixed bladder leakage with Attain in the comfort of your home. We also offer a strong performance guarantee.
The use of electrical muscle stimulation for urinary and fecal incontinence spans a 30 year period and has gained popularity as it is an effective, safe, non-invasive treatment for treating stress, urge, mixed urinary incontinence and fecal incontinence.
Electrical stimulation resolves incontinence by treating the underlying problem – it strengthens weak pelvic floor muscles and can calm an over-active detrusor muscle without the use of medications or surgery. Muscle stimulation is a first-line treatment option that should be used prior to more invasive options.
Muscle stimulation causes a contraction of the pelvic floor muscles to strengthen them (resolving stress incontinence) and can also calm an overactive detrusor muscle (resolving urge incontinence). This therapy is very valuable when a person is too weak to contract their muscles on their own and also helps you to isolate the pelvic floor muscles.
Electrical muscle stimulation can be done in your doctor’s or pelvic floor physical therapist’s office or in the privacy of your home with an FDA cleared, over-the-counter (no prescription necessary) muscle stimulation device.
InControl Medical is the market leader of home medical devices for the treatment of stress, urge, and mixed urinary incontinence and bowel incontinence. Attain – Provides not only muscle stimulation, but enhances the therapy with visual biofeedback and a visually cued exercise program. No prescription required, at-home use.
Tibial nerve stimulation delivers specific electrical impulses to the tibial nerve. During treatment, a needle electrode is inserted near the ankle. The needle electrode is then connected to the battery-powered stimulator. During a 30-minute treatment, mild impulses from the stimulator travel through the needle electrode, along the leg and to the nerves in the pelvis (sacral plexus) that control bladder function.
Typically you will need 12 in-office treatments and your physician will determine the necessity of ongoing treatments thereafter to maintain results. This type of therapy treats OAB only, not stress incontinence.
Note: Tibial nerve stimulation does not treat Stress Urinary Incontinence—it does nothing to strengthen the pelvic floor muscles.
The sacral nerves control the bladder and the muscles related to urinary function. If the brain and sacral nerves don’t communicate correctly, the nerves cannot tell the bladder to function properly. This communication problem may lead to symptoms of OAB. Neuromodulation targets these symptoms by stimulating the sacral nerves.
An electronic pacemaker-like device is implanted into your buttock area and a thin wire with an electrode tip is placed near the sacral nerve to deliver electrical impulses. Sacral Nerve Stimulation is an invasive, surgical procedure. The neurostimulator typically runs for 5-10 years. However, depending on the person’s usage requirements, it could be less than 5 years. When the battery runs out, the neurostimulator will need to be replaced, typically during another outpatient procedure.
Note: Sacral nerve stimulation does not treat Stress Urinary Incontinence—it does nothing to strengthen the pelvic floor muscles.
© 2019 InControl Medical.
