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This article is from the WebMD News Archive
Urine Leakage Not Due to Childbirth
Dec. 2, 2005 - Doctors think it's true. Patients think it's true. And urogynecologist Gunhilde M. Buchsbaum, MD, thought vaginal childbirth put women at risk of urinary incontinence.
Not any more. Buchsbaum, an associate professor at the University of Rochester, N.Y., now thinks childbirth has nothing to do with whether a woman suffers urinary incontinence after menopause.
And she has a good reason to think so. Buchsbaum's team studied pairs of postmenopausal sisters. In each pair, one sister had at least one child by vaginal delivery. The other never had a child. No matter how the researchers looked at it, the results came out the same.
"In a group of sisters where half were childless and half had children, we found no difference in urinary incontinence," Buchsbaum tells WebMD. "There was no difference in type of incontinence, overall prevalence of incontinence, or severity of incontinence."
The findings appear in the December issue of Obstetrics & Gynecology.
Sisters and Urinary Incontinence
It's very common for doctors to think that vaginal delivery puts a woman at risk of urinary incontinence. In fact, a recent survey found that 62% of urogynecologists would support a woman's decision to choose to have a C-section to prevent it.
Yet studies on childbirth and urinary incontinence are divided. Some show a risk, others fail to find one.
Buchsbaum's interest in the issue came when she was contacted by a nearby convent.
"The mother superior said, 'I think we have a problem,'" she recalls.
As they reached the age of menopause, many of the nuns were suffering urinary incontinence. Yet medical examination revealed the obvious: None of the women had ever had a child.
Preliminary studies led Buchsbaum to suspect that childbirth is not a woman's major lifetime risk factor for urinary incontinence. So she and her colleagues designed the current study.
Sisters' Sisters and Urinary Incontinence
At first, the researchers looked at the convent sisters and the sisters' married sisters. The study was later expanded to include other postmenopausal sister pairs where one had had a child by vaginal delivery and the other never gave birth.
The researchers looked at whether the women suffered urinary incontinence. They looked at whether they suffered stress incontinence (involuntary urination caused by activity such as coughing), urge incontinence (urination caused by overactive bladder), or mixed incontinence. They looked at incontinence severity. In every regard, the women who gave birth were no more likely to suffer urinary incontinence than their childless sisters.
"Everyone says vaginal delivery causes incontinence, so we looked at sisters sharing a genetic pool, to see what is the greatest risk factor -- having kids or coming from same family," Buchsbaum says. "Childbirth is no risk factor -- none."
Genetic Risk for Urinary Incontinence?
While having a child wasn't a risk for urinary incontinence, having a sister with the problem was a different story.
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Indication
Uroxatral® (alfuzosin HCl 10 mg extended-release tablets) is an alpha1-blocker for the treatment of the signs and symptoms of BPH.
Important Safety Information
Do not take UROXATRAL if you have liver problems or if you are taking antifungal drugs like ketoconazole or itraconazole, or HIV drugs like ritonavir.
UROXATRAL can cause a sudden drop in blood pressure, especially when starting treatment. This may lead to fainting, dizziness, and lightheadedness. Do not drive, operate machinery, or do any dangerous activity until you know how UROXATRAL will affect you. This is especially important if you already have a problem with low blood pressure or take medicines to treat high blood pressure. There may be an increased risk of low blood pressure and fainting when taking UROXATRAL in combination with blood pressure medication or nitrates, or erectile dysfunction medication.
If considering cataract surgery (clouding of the eyes), tell your eye surgeon that you are currently taking UROXATRAL or have previously been treated with an alpha-blocker.
Before taking UROXATRAL, tell your doctor if you have kidney problems.
Also, tell your doctor if you or any family member(s) have or take medications for a rare heart condition known as congenital prolongation of the QT interval.
BPH and prostate cancer can cause the same symptoms. However, UROXATRAL is not a treatment for prostate cancer.
The most common side effects with UROXATRAL are dizziness, upper respiratory tract infection, headache, and tiredness.
Please see UROXATRAL full prescribing information.
