It can be embarassing. In fact, it may be embarassing just to talk about it - but it is a problem that has become more common these days.
Quite simply - it's incontinence, the inability to control urination. And it is NOT just a problem for the elderly.
"No, it's certainly more common in elderly people, both men and women but it can happen in younger people and specifically we're talking about urinary incontinence in women. It can happen to younger women for various reasons," said Dr. Susan Chapman of Castle Medical Center.
There is no single cause of incontinence.
"There are many different types of urinary incontinence. For women, the two most common reasons for urinary incontinence are what we call stress incontinence which is related to an anatomy problem that usually is associated after childbirth and then the stress is related to coughing or sneezing or activity that causes the loss of urine," Chapman says.
For younger people, especially young women, there may some ways to prevent the most common causes of a lack of bladder control.
"Caffeine is one of them as many people have experienced. Also, excess alcohol consumption, various acidic foods, and also some of the artificial sweeteners, especially Nutra-sweet can cause irritation of the bladder," Chapman says.
Since the problem is a rather common one, we wondered if it's preventable.
"It's treatable, I'm not sure it's preventable. Again, maintaining a normal body weight is important. We know that women, especially that have stress incontinence where they leak urine with activity, tend to have more problems if they're overweight, so if they lose weight, very often that will help alleviate their symptoms," Chapman says.
