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Do pelvic floor exercises help, and should they be done during pregnancy and not just afterwards? Do some women have tougher collagen than others in their pelvic floor?

The answers to these questions you will find below, so keep reading.

Preventive measures and conservative treatment for UI can be initiated in primary care. Lifestyle adjustment, in particular encouraging the cessation of smoking, a trial of caffeine reduction, treating chronic cough conditions, providing advice on weight reduction and rectifying exacerbating conditions such as constipation, can often help to reduce the severity of symptoms. Advice should be given on modifying the level of fluid intake for UI or overactive bladder (OAB); the optimum is around 1-2 litres per day. Women with UI or OAB who have a BMI greater than 30 should be advised to lose weight.

Pelvic floor muscle training (PFMT) is an appropriate preventive measure and first-line treatment for most women. The aim is to promote the woman's awareness of her pelvic floor muscles and to improve their contractility and co-ordination.

Women performing pelvic floor exercise were more likely to be dry or mildly incontinent (61 per cent) than those receiving no treatment (3 per cent). A trial of supervised PFMT of at least three months' duration should be offered as first line to women with stress or mixed UI. A PFMT programme should comprise at least eight contractions three times per day and needs to be continued on a long term basis to prevent recurrence of symptoms.

PFMT should be offered to women in their first pregnancy as a preventive strategy for UI. There is evidence that PFMT used during a first pregnancy reduces the prevalence of UI at three months following delivery, but effects in the long term are inconsistent and the impact of subsequent pregnancies unknown. The prevalence of urodynamic stress incontinence is thought to be higher in Caucasians, whereas detrusor overactivity is more common among African-Americans.

Source: Pulse

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