Empowering Women’s Health: Addressing Urinary Incontinence with Dignity

On her first day back at work following the birth of her second child two years ago, Amber* received a bouquet of sunflowers, sent by her husband. Immediately upon delivery, Amber thought, This is both a blessing and a curse. “I love sunflowers,” Amber explains. “They’re my favorite to look at. But I also hate them because they make me sneeze like crazy. And sure enough, 20 minutes after I received that beautiful bouquet, I started to sneeze. And at work, that’s a problem. “The reason is that I’m a nurse, and sneezing around patients is obviously not a good thing. But that wasn’t even the worst part of it. The worst was that after one of those sneezes, I experienced a little urinary leakage episode, which was so embarrassing.” The leakage that Amber, 37, experienced is called urinary incontinence. It is an involuntary loss of urine most often caused by a weakening of the bladder or pelvic floor muscles, an overactive bladder, or nerve damage. The condition typically presents itself as a strong urge to urinate or an inability to hold urine when the urge arises, and it most often affects older women, those who are pregnant or have had children, or those who are going through menopause. As with Amber, incontinence episodes can be triggered by something as simple as a sneeze, a cough or a laugh, and they can be quite unsettling. So, it wasn’t long after her first incidence that Amber went in search of a solution for the issue. “The episode I had the day I received the sunflowers was my first episode with incontinence, but I had a similar episode a week or two later, and then another,” Amber says. “After the third, I said, I need to see someone about this. “I work for a primary care physician so it was pretty easy to find a doctor who could help. That’s how I wound up visiting Dr. Dean at the Dean Wellness Institute. And she had just the remedy I needed.”

Two for One

Dean Wellness Institute is the practice of Melissa Dean, MD. An expert in treating menopause and andropause, Dr. Dean practices traditional medicine while also offering a holistic approach to wellness. Her specialties include hormone balancing, adrenal support therapy and bioidentical hormone replacement therapy, the latter of which is considered the most natural and effective solution for hormone-related issues. At Dean Wellness Institute, Dr. Dean also offers a variety of intravenous therapies, including IV vitamin therapy, anti-aging/regenerative medicine and aesthetic treatments such as neuromodulators, hyaluronic acid-based fillers and microneedling with platelet rich plasma. In addition, Dr. Dean offers two drug-free, nonsurgical treatments for urinary incontinence. One is called the O-shot, which is an injection into the vaginal tissue of growth factors retrieved from the patient’s blood. The other features the BTL Emsella® chair, a device that uses electromagnetic energy to induce contractions that stimulate and strengthen the muscles in the pelvic floor, which restores neuromuscular control to those muscles. In treating Amber, Dr. Dean started by administering the O-shot, the process for which begins with a draw of a small amount of blood from the patient’s arm. The blood is then placed in a centrifuge, where specific growth factors are separated from it. “What we get during the spinning process in the centrifuge is a product called platelet rich plasma, or PRP,” Dr. Dean educates. “This is a solution of concentrated platelets that can be used to trigger a regeneration of the body’s soft tissue.” For the O-shot, the PRP is injected into the upper vagina and clitoris, which are numbed prior to the injection, Dr. Dean assures. The injection then sparks a regeneration of tissue that can do much more than alleviate urinary incontinence, according to the doctor. The O-shot can also improve vaginal dryness, elasticity and sensation, increase sexual arousal, and decrease pain during sex for up to 18 months. Some patients even report stronger and more frequent orgasms. “I was surprised at how quick and easy the O-shot was,” Amber notes. “It wasn’t painful at all, and it worked really well. It takes a couple of months for the growth factors to do their thing, but after three months I was a lot more carefree with my sneezes.”

The BTL Emsella Chair uses electromagnetic energy to induce contractions that strengthen the pelvic floor.

Sit Back and Relax

The O-shot worked so well that about five months after receiving it, Amber inquired about receiving a “booster.” But Dr. Dean had a different idea and suggested that Amber enhance the shot’s effectiveness through treatment on the BTL Emsella chair. “The Emsella chair is just that; it’s a chair that the patient sits on while fully clothed,” Dr. Dean explains. “As the patient sits, the chair stimulates the muscles in the pelvic floor in a way that restores neuromuscular control to those muscles.” Each BTL Emsella chair session lasts 28 minutes, and during that time, the chair produces muscle contractions that mimic the effects of 12,000 pelvic floor-tightening Kegel exercises, far more than any person can do on their own in that span. Dr. Dean adds that BTL Emsella chair treatments are not painful. “They’re actually quite comfortable,” Dr. Dean offers. “And we always make sure the patient is positioned properly so the degree of the contractions is optimal for the strengthening that needs to take place. “And that strengthening of pelvic floor muscles doesn’t just help alleviate incontinence. It also helps improve core strength and stability, and that’s very important because good core strength can help you avoid hip, pelvic and rectal problems as well as other issues.” A typical BTL Emsella treatment plan calls for patients to receive two treatments per week for three consecutive weeks. Those treatments not only help with urinary incontinence, but also bowel incontinence. They can even help patients more easily achieve orgasms. And, unlike medications, which can cause vaginal and mouth dryness, there are no side effects associated with the BTL Emsella chair. As Amber can attest, the treatments produce only positive results. “The Emsella chair is a no-brainer,” Amber enthuses. “It’s so easy because you just sit on it and relax, and long before I was done with the treatments, about halfway through those three weeks, I was already feeling a difference from them. “Now, I’m good to go. Thanks to the O-shot and the BTL Emsella chair, I have no incontinence issues whatsoever anymore, so I no longer worry about sneezing, coughing or anything causing an episode. And I can’t tell you just how great that feels. “The O-Shot and the BTL Emsella chair treatments have given me back my freedom and restored my confidence, and that is so liberating because I’m still young and very active, and now I can do what I like to do without worry. That’s why I highly recommend them. “And I want to add that I highly recommend Dr. Dean and the Dean Wellness Center as well. The entire staff there is so professional and nice. Let’s face it, incontinence is not something that’s easy to discuss, even with a doctor, but they take great care of you and treat you with respect and dignity.”

* Patient’s name changed at her request