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ThermiVa is a non-surgical vaginal tightening treatment for women who want to reclaim what childbirth or aging may have taken away. Using the same technology that’s used in ThermiTight and ThermiSmooth, radiofrequency energy is sent to the desired area (internally or externally), heating the tissue and stimulating the body’s own collagen. ThermiVa is performed in three treatments over the course of three months.
The inflatable penile prosthesis consists of two attached cylinders -- a reservoir and a pump -- which are placed surgically in the body. The two cylinders are inserted in the penis and connected by tubing to a separate reservoir of saline. The reservoir is implanted under the rectus muscles in the lower abdomen. The Coloplast Titan Touch inflatable penile prosthesis is a self-contained, fluid-filled system made from Bioflex and silicone.
An abscess is a collection of pus. Pus is a thick fluid that usually contains white blood cells, dead tissue and germs (bacteria). The usual cause of an abscess is an infection with bacteria. Certain bacteria are more likely to be 'pus-forming' as they make chemicals (toxins) that can damage the body's tissues.
When the hematocrit rises to 60 or 70%, which it often does in polycythemia, the blood viscosity can become as great as 10 times that of water, and its flow through blood vessels is greatly retarded because of increased resistance to flow. This will lead to decreased oxygen delivery.
Surgery to treat men with prostate cancer is often followed by months of difficulty controlling urine flow, a condition known as urinary incontinence. But new research suggests that this problem may go away more quickly if the men perform certain exercises to strengthen their pelvic floor muscles.
Researchers from the Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Los Angeles, California, found that men who were taught how to perform pelvic floor exercises before and after surgery were more likely to have regained continence three months later.
Men Doing Pelvic Exercises Recover Earlier
In the current study, the researchers randomly assigned 38 men scheduled for radical prostatectomy to either a treatment group or a control group. The men in the treatment group were referred to a physical therapist. They were instructed how to do Pelvic Floor Exercises both before and after surgery, using biofeedback to ensure they were using the proper muscles. The control group did not receive any formal instruction. All of the men completed questionnaires regarding bladder function at regular intervals over the next year.
Overall, 82% of the patients had regained continence (defined as not needing to use any absorbent pads) by the end of the year, including about equal numbers in both groups. But on average the men who had been educated about Pelvic exercises regained continence about one month earlier than those in the control group (at 12 weeks vs. 16 weeks).
Most of the men who did not regain continence within a year were still using at least three absorbent pads a day, indicating continued severe incontinence. The study authors explained that these men probably had extensive damage to the bladder sphincter or severe dysfunction of the bladder after surgery, and the exercises alone were unable to compensate for this.
But the exercises seemed to be effective. Pelvic floor exercise and education initiated prior to surgery is an effective noninvasive intervention useful for improving early return of urinary continence, the authors concluded. It would certainly have a positive impact on our patients undergoing radical prostatectomy in an effort to improve quality of life after major urological surgery.
The results of the study were published in the Journal of Urology (Vol. 170, No. 1: 130-133)