Not Only Women Should Pay Attention to Their Pelvic Floor

It’s fair to say that most people never give their pelvic floor muscles any thought at all until they have a problem.  The pelvic floor group of muscles work like every other muscle in the body, but because they are inside the body, they are easily ignored.

Of course both men and women have the same pelvic floor muscles—mostly. The superficial layer is a little different, but the deeper layers of muscles, bladder and rectum are all the same, and men can have the same issues with urinary incontinence or pelvic pain as women.

Recent studies show that many men undergoing a radical prostatectomy (having the prostate removed due to cancer)will be incontinent as a result of the surgery, and having a pre-operative program of Kegels (pelvic floor muscle exercises) can help after surgery for men to use fewer pads for a shorter period of time.  These studies demonstrated that men who work to strengthen their pelvic floor muscles prior to surgery do better than the “controls”—the group who does Kegels leak less urine, and score better on the Incontinence Assessment Scale (ICIQ-SF).

At Elevation Physiotherapy & Wellness, we have physiotherapists who specialize in pelvic health, and can ensure that any man is performing Kegels properly, start a program of exercises to be done daily, and progress through more difficult variations of exercises as each man is able. Studies show that these treatments are inexpensive, and have zero side effects.  Don’t buy pads forever—get to work strengthening the pelvic floor. It can help you get better, faster.

https://elevation-physio.com/services/pelvic-health-physiotherapy/

Aylin Aydın Sayılan and Ayfer Özbaş. The Effect of Pelvic Floor Muscle Training On Incontinence Problems  After  Radical Prostatectomy. 2018: American Journal of Men’s Health, Vol. 12(4): 1007-1015

Li-Hui Pan et al. Improvement of Urinary Incontinence, Life Impact, and Depression and Anxiety With Modified Pelvic Floor Muscle Training After Radical Prostatectomy.  2019: American Journal of Men’s Health, Vol. 13(2): 1-10

Change Your Brain—Neuroplasticity Rocks!

As we get older, we unfortunately discover that our brains can slow down too.  Some studies that involve both humans and animals have shown that regular aerobic exercise like walking or jogging can give a boost to memory and cognition.  Aerobic exercise can increase the number of new neurons in the brain’s memory centre, and also decrease inflammation. It’s inflammation in the brain that can lead to the development of dementia.

Until recently, there has not been much research on how resistance training can affect the brain.  Obviously weight lifting builds muscles, but can it affect the cells and function of the brain?

An interesting study was recently published in the Journal of Applied Physiology, where the authors taped weighted pellets to the butts of rats, and had them train on a 100cm ladder. After several weeks, the climbing rats showed increased muscle mass.

A separate group of rats were injected with a substance that causes inflammation in the brain that created symptoms of early dementia. Half of these rats began weight training, and over weeks, the weights strapped to their butts became heavier to progress their strength training.

After 5 weeks, all rats were let loose into a maze where they were expected to run immediately for one dark chamber, and they would learn where that was located so that each time they were admitted into the maze, they should run directly there.  What they learned is that after a few repetitions, the cognitively impaired rats who did the weight training surpassed the speed and accuracy of the control rats . The authors of this study concluded that the weight training had restored the rats’ ability to think, since the untrained rats with mild dementia continued to lag far behind the others in their ability to find the dark chamber.

Upon examination of the brains of these rats, there was inflammation found  in the brains of the rats who had been injected with the chemical, but the brains of the rats who did the weight training showed a huge number of enzymes and genetic markers that would create new neurons, allowing the brain to remodel itself.

Obviously rats are not people, and it isn’t known that the brains of people who weight train would behave in the same way to lifting weights. It is fair to say that resistance training is beneficial for muscle mass and strength, for bone density and metabolism, and if it does help to protect the brain, so much the better!

At Elevation Physiotherapy & Wellness, our Physiotherapists are able to develop a resistance program that is individual for you, based on your own goals. Call us to talk about how we may be able to make your brain stronger!