Scottish women to take part in ‘big squeeze’ to promote bladder health

WOMEN from across Scotland have taken part in an attempt to break a unique world record to raise awareness of a common medical issue – by simultaneously joining in with pelvic floor exercises.

Elaine Miller, from Fife, is looking to promote the importance of doing pelvic floor exercises.

“The World’s Biggest Squeeze” was aimed at promoting bladder health following a national survey which found that difficulty in bladder control affects more women in Scotland than hayfever.

The study, conducted by Yougov and funded by Natacare, revealed a high number of respondents were too embarrassed to discuss the topic of incontinence with a healthcare professional.

Despite being a common medical issue, just 9 percent of women said they had talked to a partner or friend about incontinence, while more than a third of those polled were unaware leakage can be cured through pelvic floor exercises.

And Natracare – a UK-based company which manufactures plastic-free period products – challenged women to log in to a live Facebook stream to to take the topic of incontinence from taboo to traction by joining the record attempt.

Hosted by Edinburgh-based physiotherapist and comedian Elaine Miller, women were able to participate in the Valentine’s Day attempt at home and live chat with others taking part online.

Elaine, who performed a live stand-up show at the 2018 Edinburgh Festival Fringe on the topic of incontinence, commented: “The World’s Biggest Squeeze is a clever way to get women thinking about their pelvic floors. Most women know they have a pelvic floor and that they should be doing exercises, but they’re not confident about doing them properly and forget about them.”

“Worse still, they wrongly think that leaking is normal – this is such a shame because physiotherapy works and women don’t need to put up with it.

“I was excited to be hosting the Biggest Squeeze online event and promoting this magnificent act of self love to show women how to laugh and not leak.”

Further results from Natracare’s survey found that 73 percent of people in Scotland think only the elderly struggle with bladder control.

The company primarily hopes to enlighten people of the fact that by doing pelvic floor exercises, incontinence can be cured, meaning less women will go through with more potentially harmful means of treatment such as vaginal mesh surgery. NHS advice says anyone suffering from any kind of bladder incontinence should seek advice from their GP as soon as possible.