Do you find yourself constantly thinking about where the nearest toilet is, making frequent trips throughout the day, or rushing to get there in time while trying not too leak?
Bladder & Bowel Dysfunction
Sometimes pelvic pain is about more than just pain.
​Many people experience bladder symptoms such as needing to urinate frequently, a strong sense of urgency, waking multiple times at night to wee, or discomfort as the bladder fills — even when urine tests show no sign of infection. While these symptoms are common, they are not something you simply have to put up with.
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Pelvic floor physiotherapy is an effective, evidence-based treatment for bladder dysfunction. A pelvic floor physiotherapist will assess how your pelvic floor muscles, bladder habits, breathing patterns, posture, movement, and nervous system are working together and contributing to your symptoms.
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Treatment may include pelvic floor muscle retraining, bladder retraining, nervous system and pain regulation strategies, education, and practical lifestyle modifications. The goal is to reduce urgency and frequency, improve bladder control, ease discomfort, and help you regain confidence in your body and bladder function.
Awareness & Pain
Frequent trips to the toilet
Rushing to get there in time
Waking during the night to urinate
Discomfort or pain as the bladder fills
Ongoing bladder symptoms despite normal urine tests
Constipation or difficulty emptying
Straining during bowel movements
Feeling unable to fully empty the bowels
Urgency to open your bowels
Pain before, during, or after a bowel movement​
Emptying
Feeling unable to fully empty your bladder or bowels
Feeling of fullness after emptying
Needing to return to the toilet shortly after going
Slow, hesitant, stop-start, or split urine stream
Difficulty initiating or completing urine flow
Straining or difficulty relaxing to empty
Needing to change position to pass a bowel motion
Ongoing sensation of incomplete emptying or needing to go again
Frequency & Urgency
Frequent urination
Urgent need to pee
Rushing to the toilet
Passing small amounts of urine
Needing to pee again soon after emptying
Waking at night to pee
Frequent bowel motions
Urgent need to open your bowels
Rushing to the toilet
Difficulty delaying a bowel urge
Multiple bowel motions in a short period
Urgency during exercise
Leakage
Leakage of urine when coughing, sneezing, laughing, running, or lifting
Small or large urine leaks with urgency or on the way to the toilet
Post-urination dribble
Difficulty holding urine
Inability to hold in bowel movements
Leakage or smearing of stool on underwear
Faecal leakage without needing to pass a bowel motion
Bowel leakage during exercise or physical activity
Leakage of stool due to incomplete emptying
Strong evidence that pelvic floor physiotherapy works
Level 1A evidence indicates strong support for a clinical intervention. Pelvic floor physiotherapy has Level 1A evidence for the use of pelvic floor muscle training to improve anorectal dysfunctions, including faecal incontinence, constipation, and bowel urgency
(Igualada-Martinez, Breslin, Higgins, & Hainsworth, 2022) .