Tummy tuck for stress incontinence

For a number of years, the tummy tuck has been one of the most frequently performed procedures in aesthetic plastic surgery. Understandably, because this treatment gives you back the beautiful, firm and smooth abdomen that so many young people take for granted, without stopping to think that the years can take their toll on it. Especially in the run-up to the summer months, the number of people visiting the plastic surgeon’s consulting room to discuss the options for a tummy tuck or, for example, liposuction, grows.

Tummy tuck for Stress Incontinence

A question a plastic surgeon is unlikely to be asked is whether he can do anything about involuntary loss of urine. Quite a lot of women already experience stress incontinence at a fairly young age. This is the type of incontinence in which a woman is unable to control her bladder under sudden abdominal pressure, caused for example by coughing, sneezing, physical exercise or laughing. Moreover, stress incontinence is a common side effect of a natural birth, even after the first birth. Strangely enough, little attention is paid to this.

Women who suffer from stress incontinence are referred by their GP to the gynaecologist when their problem becomes too great an obstacle in daily life.

The remarkable news is that various studies have shown that a tummy tuck can also help some of these women to solve the problem of stress incontinence. Many women undergo a tummy tuck after a pregnancy to regain the firm abdominal contour they had before. Several studies now show that this procedure not only achieves this goal, but can also make the stress incontinence that developed after giving birth disappear again.

A tummy tuck removes excess fat and skin and will also strengthen the abdominal wall. This can mean that less fat and weight presses on the bladder.
So a tummy tuck can help you reduce the effects of a pregnancy and natural birth in more ways than just aesthetically. If your incontinence started with your pregnancy, there is a chance that a tummy tuck can help you reduce these complaints. In women who have had a caesarean section, the proven effect is smaller.

The studies.

After earlier small studies in this area of a tummy tuck for stress incontinence, a larger study has now been carried out (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25073582). This shows that the tummy tuck had a positive effect on stress incontinence in sixty per cent of the women operated on. Especially in women who had not yet had a caesarean section. Further research is needed, the researchers emphasise. But it is certainly an interesting development. After all, aesthetic plastic surgery serves to enhance the body. If it also serves a medical purpose, that is an enormous added value.

Read more about this treatment and what it can do for you aesthetically on the page about the tummy tuck.