Urinary incontinence in youth volleyball
Have you and your athlete talked about leaking urine during sports? Read on to see why you should…
Stress urinary incontinence is defined as the inability to control urine with physical exercise or activity such as jumping or squatting. It may also mean leaking urine with coughing, sneezing, and laughing. 17% of the general population deals with this, however that percentage increases to 75% in youth volleyball players. 23% of females will decrease or stop exercising due to symptoms of urinary incontinence.
Leaking often occurs due to a dysfunction of the pelvic floor muscles, luckily physical therapists specialize in the musculoskeletal system and can help with these symptoms. Everyone has a pelvic floor, no matter the gender. Did you know there are three layers of muscles inside the pelvis?
The first and second layers' primary role of the pelvic floor is to open and close to allow things to pass through our body. The third layer's role of the pelvic floor is to help support our organs. The pelvic floor is also very closely orientated to the back, hip, abdomen, and leg muscles which can contribute to pelvic floor dysfunction.
Sometimes our pelvic floor can be weak and sometimes our pelvic floor can be tight (just like any other part of our body). If our muscles are weak or tight, they don’t function as well as we would like and can lead to urine leaking.
So what is physical therapy going to do for my pelvic floor?
We will learn about the different muscles in your body and how they can help with symptoms
We will work on relaxing the pelvic floor and / or strengthen the pelvic floor and surrounding muscles
We will teach pressure management in the abdomen to improve urine leakage
Other things we can discuss in pelvic floor physical therapy are the importance of a regular menstrual cycle, what to do if you’re experiencing painful periods, vaginal pain, chronic hip or back pain, and many more. Let’s help keep our youth athletes playing, start asking them questions and reach out if you want more information!
Lexi Noel, DPT
Loon State Physical Therapy
