EP. 09: Urinary Tract Health
Who has ever been on an antibiotic for a UTI and then had to get on something else for a yeast infection?
Today, we’re going deeper into urinary tract health and the common signs and symptoms of UTIs. This isn’t just for us women, this also applies to our guys who maybe have been struggling with enlarged prostates, too. There’s truly so much more we can do holistically and naturally aside from the age-old advice of simply drinking more water or cranberry juice.
Of course we dive into the research, but also I have tips and insight from my own experience. I’ve received and provided relief through acupuncture for recurring infections and recovery from the pain. D-Mannose is an herb that actually provides similar results to an antibiotic with faster symptom resolution and less recurrence of UTIs. You can also add more pumpkin seeds or parsley to your diet . There are things as simple as changing-up our undergarments and switching from those popular moisture-wicking brands to cotton and bamboo.
Additionally, we discuss overactive bladder and the strength of our pelvic floor as we age. An interesting side-note, if you’re low in Vitamin D, you’re more at risk for overactive bladder and incontinence! The vascular system is so tight and compact, that medication changes (diuretics, antihistamines, muscle relaxers) have a huge impact on your urinary tract.
Show Notes
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0:00:00
Hi everybody, I hope that you're doing well. Welcome to another podcast. So I hope that you guys are enjoying everything. And again, I always appreciate feedback. So if you have any topics that you want to cover, or any guests that you would love to have on either local or regional or state level, I can certainly reach out to them
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0:00:27
and just kind of keep this conversation going. So the topics, the next few topics that we're doing on the podcasts are topics from you guys, which I always enjoy hearing from you. So, and these are ones that I frequently discuss in practice, so I feel like they're very applicable
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0:00:46
to daily life. So the one that we're talking about today is urinary tract health. This affects men, it affects women of course. As we get older, when we have a urinary tract infection, a lot of times we don't know about it and the symptoms can be a little fuzzy. Typically, you know, there's that burning sensation, that urgency to go, but as we get older it can manifest as dizziness or confusion or vertigo.
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0:01:17
So it's really, really important to kind of stay on top of that, not only for you, but for your friends and family and loved ones. They do make, one thing I always tell my patients is make sure that you have the AZO test strips
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that you can have at home, because that way you can test at home and then contact your provider. If it shows that you have a urinary tract infection, it just kind of speeds things along a little bit and helps to take the guesswork out. It gives you guys a little bit more power. They have those at any supermarket, drugstore,
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0:01:49
and they work really well. So that's something I always recommend to have on hand. So let's talk a little bit about urinary tract infections, right? So I want to talk about that. I want to talk about stress incontinence, right? That's a growing concern.
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And then overactive bladder. We see all of these drug commercials for medications, right? And of course there's medications for everything now and medications for the side effects of medications. So let's talk about risk factors and causes, and I'm going to give you guys some tips on what we can do naturally and kind of give you back the power of your own health. So risk factors with UTIs, right?
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No surprise here. Women, we are just more prone to them. It's because of our anatomy, right? We have a shorter urethra than men do. There's less distance for bacteria to travel to reach the bladder, so we're more prone to that. We in general just experience more UTIs in our lifetime than men do as well. Sex, sex can do it too. So if you're not peeing after sex, make sure that you do that immediately after. Sex is fantastic and we all need sex in our lives, but that's a really important habit to kind
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of get into. And then the other thing to think about if you do have a new sex partner, you want to just be aware that there is an increased risk of more UTIs of that just because of different bacteria, different interactions with the skin and fluids and everything else like that. So sex can definitely lead to more UTIs. One thing that we don't talk about a lot with UTIs too is birth control. And I know not a lot of my friends and not a lot of my patients use
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the diaphragms. They're kind of like the older ones. Gosh, I think my mom used that in the 70s. They're still around of course, but with that there's more of a risk of a UTI, right? You're touching it, you're inserting it up in there. And now those kind of changes can increase the risk of UTIs. Condoms as well. So anything that you're touching that you're inserting up there
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0:04:11
can of course lead to more UTIs. Menopause. This is so glanced over when we're talking about UTIs. So menopause, of course, is an exciting change of life for us as women, right? It's a new stage. But the chance of that with UTIs, it goes up quite a bit. And the reason for that is because of the decline in
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circulating estrogen, that can cause changes in the urinary tract. So a lot of times I'll have women say, you know, there's less lubrication during sex or there's more vaginal dryness. That's all hormone related. Totally understand that. But that can also increase the risk of UTIs as well. There are some really good natural remedies that we can we can suggest for increasing lubrication and we'll talk about that when we talk about our pelvic health and pelvic floor podcasts. But
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0:05:08
they also do make, if you're into prescriptions, they do make prescription estrogen cream that you can use to not only help with the lubrication, but also to lessen the risk of the UTIs. So that's something to consider. If you're a woman and you've gone through menopause or you're going through menopause and all of a sudden you have a UTI after UTI after UTI and you're like, what is going on? It's very much hormone related.
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So that's something to think about. And then the other thing to consider too with kids, if babies are born with issues with the urinary tract or have urinary tract infections as kids, they're more likely to have UTIs throughout their life. So that's something to consider.
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0:05:55
If you have history of kidney stones or for my guys, the enlarged prostate, that is a big risk factor for UTIs and with BPH with an enlarged prostate you definitely have more inflammation down there so that it can also fall into the risk of UTIs. Something to think about with risk factors, diabetes. So many patients of mine have type 2 diabetes now right? So you kind of get that triad you have high blood pressure, you have high cholesterol, maybe diabetes type 2. With that suppressed immune system and the sugar
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issues, you're more likely to develop UTIs as well. So that's something to consider with any autoimmune. If you're immunocompromised or going through cancer treatment, the body's immune defenses are a little bit lowered of course so you're going to be more prone to UTIs. Catheter use this is just common sense right guys because you're touching things, you're inserting, a lot of risk for contamination and then no-brainer here like a recent urinary tract procedure if you've had anything
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done risk of infection with that. So there's a lot of causes. Lifestyle causes, lifestyle changes as well. So what we can do, make sure you're getting enough water. You know, water is so important. And not only just water in general, but the type of water. We want high mineral content water,
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we definitely want good electrolytes. We don't wanna drink tap water, we wanna filter it. And we'll do a whole podcast on tap water and contaminants
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and how to have healthy and filtered water.
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Because I've also had patients get over watered, right? Too much water. They're drinking gallons of water. They're depleting their electrolytes and that can also be harmful to the body. So you just want to get enough water. The rule of thumb is eight ounces is half your body weight in ounces a day of water. But again, make sure it's good quality water.
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So get enough water. Diet, you guys know I talk about nutrition all the time. So a diet high in carbs, standard American diet, will lead to more risk of UTIs. Diet high in carbs and low in protein. So we wanna switch that.
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We want high protein, high fat, lower carbs and carbs from fruits and veggies, not refined grains. Not only for the inflammation component, but from the sugar balancing as well. So lots of things that you guys can do to kind of take ownership and, and kind of resolve these UTIs. So the symptoms, I kind of covered some of them that urgency to go, that burning, you feel like you've gone but there's still more in
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there, which is an awful feeling. I've been there. Urine that's a little bit cloudy, sometimes you can have a little blood so it might look pink or red. If it's really strong, that can be a sign. The other one that is women we kind of get dismissed about is pelvic pain, right? So that can be a sign of a UTI, especially like in the center of the pelvis and around the pubic bone. So any cystitis, any inflammation down there, you definitely want to get that checked out and make sure. Again, that's why it's nice to have those at-home test strips.
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That way you can kind of just pee on it, see what's going on, and then you know. And then you can either do holistic intervention or contact your primary for an antibiotic or whatever you need at that point. So let's talk about what we can do, right, to prevent them. I've talked about drinking water. That, of course, just flushes the system out. We want to keep everything nice and flowing. Cranberry juice, if you told probably 90% of the population, what can I do for UTI, everyone's gonna say cranberry, right? That's what we grew up learning about.
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Cranberry juice can be really good. However, there's a lot of sugar in it. So you wanna get the tart cranberry juice, no sugar added, so make sure that it's just pure. And the dose of the tart, it's gonna be very, very, very tart, so you're not gonna be drinking big glasses of it
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like you would like a blend of a cranberry juice. So you wanna do like two, four ounces.
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So that's good.
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There are some really good studies for cranberry juice. It's been around forever. But there's better ones out there that we'll talk about. So for women, of course, wiping front to back, no surprise here. We grew up learning that.
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0:10:48
It's just a really good thing just to keep in mind, especially as we get older and we get busy. Let's talk about underwear. Underwear and feminine products, right? So we'll do a whole podcast on makeup and healthy self-care products in the future, but
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0:11:03
look at your tampons, look at your pads, look at your panty liners, look at all of that because they're bleached, they have a lot of chemicals in them, especially the tampons. If you're using tampons and you're inserting them up in, lots of contamination, but you're absorbing everything in that tampon as well. So I When I have to use something, I use organic tampons. That's my go-to.
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0:11:43
I can certainly give you guys a link with what I use. The scented ones and the fancy ones you want to stay away from. You don't want to use any deodorant sprays down there, any douches, any powders. Any of that that's not natural, right, can cause some irritation, cause some inflammation, get the immune system flared up, and that can kind of lead to more risk for infection, right? Underwear. My goodness, clothing has changed so much, even since I grew up,
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0:12:15
right? Yoga pants was never a thing. Now yoga pants is a daily thing, especially for me as a busy mom. I live in yoga pants. But what we have to think about is what's in those yoga pants and our underwear. So before I left work in the multidisciplinary practice I was in, it was funny because the imaging department started carrying scrubs for the patients to put on for getting imaging. And I'm like, why are they putting patients in scrubs? Here there's some plastics and metals in some of the yoga pants and
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0:12:51
That can interfere with the imaging equipment and obviously you don't want that to happen So you have to think about anything in the yoga pants. I need plastics any metals Any artificial fabric which most of those are that gets absorbed into the skin? and same with underwear like the Athletic underwear that is super absorbent, sweat-proof, all of that other stuff,
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that is directly up against the area and that can lead to more UTIs. So if you're noticing that, it might be time to switch to cotton underwear that can breathe, right? We've used cotton forever.
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Cotton and silk, bamboo's another really good one, that's naturally antibacterial. And there's some really good companies out there that have really comfy bamboo underwear. And there's some good companies out there that I like for yoga pants that aren't synthetic fabrics.
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So that's something to consider. And then of course we talked about birth control, but the other thing to consider is your lubrication. So if you're using, you know, like K1 or some kind of scented or flavored lotion or lube or whatever you're into, you might take a peek at that because again anything that's up in that area can cause irritation, inflammation, cause an
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immune reaction, and I will link some of my favorite natural pH balancers, but also some of my natural lubrications that work very well, but they don't have all that chunk in there, right? Coconut oil, that's something that I use a lot. It's natural, it's a good fatty acid, it's a great lubricant,
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so that's something you can certainly do. But I'll link the other ones if you wanna look into the pH balancers as well. So we know the risk factors. Um, we know what can cause them. We know, um, all the lifestyle things to consider. So what can we do about it? Right. I mentioned cranberry juice.
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There's really cool research and a lot of it's done the last couple of years on acupuncture. So, um, with acupuncture, if you've not had it done, I highly encourage you to check it out. I grew up getting it done from my natural past because I had female issues back then and modern medicine, I don't want to say failed me, but didn't lead me in the direction of health and wellness that I should have been going in.
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And thankfully my mom recognized that. So after failed surgeries and birth controls and weight gain when you're 12 and 13, and that's a trying time of your life anyway, I went to this natural doctor and acupuncture worked really well.
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So the premise with that is there's different energy highways in the body. There's 12 main meridians and then there's extra ones. And the whole point is to create balance in the body. The rule of thought is if there's a block in the energy, then there's disease or pathology.
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0:16:09
So you wanna open up that energy. So the energy pathways are named for where they flow to and through. So you have like the liver, the heart, the kidney, the bladder. They're all related to different organs.
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So what we find for UTIs, there's a liver point, right?
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We know this.
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The liver processes all of our hormones and helps with our immune system and toxins. So there's a liver point, liver point eight, which is just above the knee, inner leg. It gets really tender when you have a UTI. And then the other one is spleen six,
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which is just below the knee on the inner calf. So those two, through the research, definitely help acute UTIs. And it's nice because then you don't have to worry about getting on an antibiotic, if it's caught early enough, and then who has had this happen, right? You get on an antibiotic, then you get a yeast infection. Then you have to get on something for a yeast infection. It's so frustrating. So acupuncture is a great way to go.
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0:17:06
The other acupuncture points, kidney, right, we're talking about kidneys and bladder. So kidney works well, that helps for painful urination, and then there's some also some other ones that just help with the recovery and the pain. With looking at urinary stress incontinence, there's a really good study that came out last year. They looked at eight studies and they had a pretty big patient group. It was about 700 patients. So the group that had traditional Chinese medicine had
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more advantages in improving the clinical outcomes of stress urinary incontinence. They had less urinary leakage on the pad and they had more urethral closure pressure so they could control it more. So if you're struggling with any stress urinary incontinence, acupuncture would definitely be something to look into. Holistically, herb-wise, right?
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0:18:12
So we've covered acupuncture. Cranberry has some benefits, right? I have no doubt on that. The one that I always tell my patients, my friends, my family, if they say, hey, Heather, what can I do for UTI?
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Manose, D-mannose. It's a powder, it's a sugar, it won't affect your blood sugar, it's a five carbon sugar. What that little sugar does is it helps to prevent bacteria from sticking to the urinary tract.
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It's so cool and it works well. There's really good research for that. A lot of times the companies will combine cranberry extract with D-mannose, so you kind of get the best of both. But D-mannose is cool because it's been shown
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when they looked at a study with D-mannose versus the antibiotic, which is really common, nitrofuratonin or no treatment, D-mannose reduced the risk of recurrent UTIs similar to the antibiotic. How about that? That's pretty cool. And no side effects, no yeast infections. There's another one that showed with women with recurrent UTIs. The recurrence was four times
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longer with D-mannose versus antibiotic. So it took 200 days for another UTI versus 53 with an antibiotic. That's huge, right? We know how painful UTIs are. And then the other one looked at using D-Manos with antibiotics. So if you want to do both, you can do that. But they found that there's a faster symptom resolution and decreased recurrence with D-Manos. So even if you are really suffering and you need to go in an antibiotic,
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take D-Manos, it won't hurt ya. The other cool thing, and this just came out this year, they found that D-mannose suppresses breast cancer. Cool, right? I won't go into the science with it too much, but it plays a role with oxidation
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and targeting those breast cancer cells more. So there's some other benefits, right? I always love herbs that are multifunctional, right? It just doesn't do one thing, it does so many different things. So the dose for D-mannose, I like it as a powder,
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just put it in some liquid, some water, or whatever you're drinking, 1.5 to two grams. Doesn't taste like anything. So, and it is, like I said, it's a sugar, it's a monosaccharide, and it just inhibits bacteria from sticking to that tract.
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So, pretty cool. The other one, which is an old one, Uva Ursi. Uva Ursi, right? It's nicknamed bear berry because bears love this thing.
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They eat a lot of it.
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It's been around for centuries. And what they found, the research again, is all the last couple of years, they looked at Uva Ursi with, here's the liver again, right? Dandelion root, that reduced UTI recurrence
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compared to placebo, right? That's worth it. A lot of times I'll have patients do dandelion tea just for a good liver tonic. There's, my favorite is like a roasted dandelion tea and you just add a little bit of honey.
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It doesn't really taste like much, but it just helps with supporting the liver. And remember, with acupuncture, I said that you want to treat the liver with treating UTI. So liver plays a big role with that. The dose is about 200 to 840 milligrams.
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So it just depends. The only catch with Uva Ursi is based on the research, you don't want to take it for more than one to two weeks, just because of potential irritation of the liver and kidneys, according to the research. But it's again one of those that have been around for centuries and a short term that would be a great one to target. There's one more study that
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showed that, so if you know that you always get a UTI and it's always staph aureus, S aureus, uva-ursi is very effective against that. So there's all different ones. E. coli can cause UTIs. There's a lot of different ones, but if you know for sure that's your your strain, Uva Ursi. The other thing we can talk about is tea. You know, I mentioned dandelion tea for the liver. Parsley and chamomile are also wonderful. They're diuretics, so those help to kind of flush the system out.
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0:22:52
Parsley tea is one of my secrets for getting rid of extra water weight too. So that's always one if I know like I have a wedding coming up or a special event and I just want to trim down a couple pounds, I really start pushing the parsley tea. You can always buy it pre-made or you can make your own. It's pretty easy. It tastes awful. I'm not gonna lie. It tastes like hay, but just add a little bit of raw honey to it. And then of course green tea, right? We
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know green tea is good for so many things. It's a great antioxidant. Again, it just flushes the system out and it strengthens the immune system. So if tea is your jam, you can certainly do some tea. And then I just briefly wanted to talk about overactive bladder. This is a really common issue and in general pelvic health, whether you're a male or a female, is really a big issue these days because of surgeries, right? Hysterectomies, you're taking out parts so there's not that strength in that musculature like there used to be. As we
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get older there's atrophy just like anything else. We lose tone in our pelvic floor. So overactive bladder, you'll see tons of commercials for these. And it definitely can be limiting with enjoying your quality of life, right? If you want to go somewhere, you kind of think about, okay, where's the bathroom or what do I do or do I have to wear pads or panties or whatever? So one of the solutions for that or potential solutions is acupuncture, right? Here we go with acupuncture again.
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0:24:26
So they found that it helps to, and this is really cool to me. So they looked at doing acupuncture with overactive bladder, and it actually improves the release of abnormal neurotransmitters in the urinary tract and the incoming signal of the bladder. That's kind of cool, right? And the cool thing about it is it's cost-effective, low side effects, and it's well researched. So it actually changes the
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neurochemistry with the bladder. That's pretty neat. And then there's one more study that showed looking at the kidney, right, and the spleen again, specific points at a trial of four weeks and for maintenance of once a week, sessions lasting about 20 to 30 minutes, they found that acupuncture is very effective and precise for treating overactive bladder.
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So pretty cool. And then this should be no surprise to you guys, vitamin D, right? Oh my gosh, we know vitamin D does so many things. But if you have low vitamin D, you're more at risk for overactive bladder. That's interesting. I thought that was really interesting.
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So make sure, again, no surprise here, get your vitamin D checked in the spring and in the fall. We want it really high at both times, but at least in the summer we're getting vitamin D naturally. So vitamin D supplementation can be effective for prevention or alleviation of bladder symptoms such as overactive bladder or incontinence. So get your vitamin D checked. And then the other things to consider with overactive bladder, smoking, right? We know smoking is awful.
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0:26:14
My smokers that are my patients, they have the worst spines, right? Because of the circulation and the microvasculature, it just tears up the body. The vasculature is so small in the bladder and for men especially like the prostate, prostate issues are innately linked to heart issues. So smoking, I mean that's a no-brainer. Coughing can affect leakage, smoking can affect microvasculature, so that's an issue. And then the other thing to consider with overactive bladders, medication changes. So if it's possible, you might talk to your physician about
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maybe getting off some of the medications or reevaluating those because diuretics, so things like hydrochlorothiazide for blood pressure, antihistamines, it's allergy season, who doesn't take an antihistamine, right? Muscle relaxants for back pain, sedatives, narcotics, all worsen overactive bladder. So that's something to think about too,
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0:27:23
just kind of thinking outside the box. So things herbally, besides we know acupuncture helps, right, things herbally that we can do for overactive bladder for guys, and this helps prostate too, saw palmetto. Works beautifully for BPH issues. The other one is it's a Chinese blend. It's gosha jinki gan. It's a combination of 10 herbs. It reduces frequency,
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urgency, and nighttime urination. That's huge and there's really good research on that. Pumpkin seed. So if you're a new mom, pumpkin seed improves pelvic floor health. So that's cool. So eat my, my thought process, eat more pumpkin seeds. But you can always do a pumpkin seed extract. It also helps with the passage of urine. So controlling that.
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0:28:15
No surprise here, magnesium. We're all low in magnesium. It does so many things. So magnesium might be something to think about besides your vitamin D. So I know we've talked a lot. I will make sure that I give you guys links
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to some healthy panties, some healthy yoga pants that aren't synthetic, some really good supplements that I like for D-mannose, and Uva Ursi, and just different options. That way you have some more tools in your toolkits and like the AZO test strips. And then of course give me some feedback. If there's something you want me to go
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into deeper or a new topic just send me an email, reach out to me or find me on into deeper or a new topic just send me an email, reach out to me or find me on
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social media.
Transcribed with Cockatoo