Urinary incontinence

For many people, urinary incontinence severely limits their routine activities and even damage their quality of life and self-esteem. The most common of it includes urge urinary incontinence and stress urinary incontinence. Urge urinary incontinence is usually due to overactive bladder syndrome. The symptoms of an overactive bladder are supposed to be due to involuntary contractions of the detrusor muscle in the bladder wall throughout the filling phase of the micturition cycle. Women who have given birth have postpartum stress urinary incontinence.

Acupuncture treatment may benefit in people with urinary incontinence by decreasing the expression of c-Fos in the brain, as well as controlling nitrergic neurotransmitters so as to increase nitric oxide levels in bladder tissue, therefore relaxing smooth muscle and allowing increased bladder capacity. Besides, acupuncture may be the only CAM therapy with evidence of benefit, even at a preliminary level. Also, acupuncture may be most useful when given together with appropriate exercise regimes, but larger and better designed trials are required to fully elucidate its effects for people with urinary incontinence.

尿失禁

對於許多人來說，尿失禁嚴重限制了他們的日常活動，甚至損害了他們的生活質素和自尊。其中最常見的包括急迫性尿失禁和壓力性尿失禁。急迫性尿失禁通常是由於膀胱過度活動綜合症。膀胱過度活動症的症狀應該是由於在整個排尿週期的充盈階段膀胱壁中的逼尿肌不自主收縮。分娩的婦女有產後壓力性尿失禁。

針灸治療或許可以通過降低大腦中c-Fos的表達，以及控制氮能神經遞質以增加膀胱組織中的一氧化氮水平，從而放鬆平滑肌並增加膀胱容量，使尿失禁患者得到幫助。此外，針灸可能是唯一有證據證明有益的CAM療法，即使在初步水平上也是如此。同時，針灸與適當的運動方案一起使用時可能是最有用，但需要更大、設計更好的試驗來充分闡明其對尿失禁患者的影響。