UOAA Discussion Board

So, as a recently joined member, have a question for all you doods and doodettes smarter than me! How long did you have to irrigate or flush? I had my surgery in May of 06 and I have not flushed for a couple of mos now. Is this normal? I don't seem to be experiencing any issues. I do get pain now and then and notice more mucous in my urine when I cath but noting beyond that. Should I still be doing this with regular frequency?

I no longer irrigate- my pouch is 15 yrs.old, BUT I know I should do it at least a few times a week. When ever you see the mucus getting a bit thick you really should irrigate it. This will also help to cut down on the risk of infection. The reason I do not irrigate my pouch is due to the fact that when I irrigate it, it goes into horrendous spasms. I think this is because I had/have a disease called Interstitial Cystitis. It is the reason I had my bladder out, but it affects smooth muscle and I also have bowel problems from it. So this is why I have some pouch issues still. I do love my pouch and am still extremely happy with it.

Last night, I had posted a response to the question of how often I irrigate, and in the post was trying to poke fun at myself.

Now, I just awoke (1:45 AM here in California) because I had fallen asleep without voiding/cathing since 5:30PM -and I found that only the first two entries remain in this thread???

Anyway, in case my response got removed as spam because it was NOT funny - it wasn't, but did not contain anything offensive (again, the beginning of this sentence was my strange sense of humor at work), I irrigate about every two to three days.

I have had a prescription for 20 half liters of normal saline every month since the beginning and was irrigating twice a day for the first eight months (till about jan or Feb 2005), mostly because no one told me to change from the orignal routine. Went to once a day after I thought I had a UTI with a single, tiny spot of bright red blood on mucus during voiding and was told by a new ET nurse that I could cut back to once a day and was told not to worry about the blood AND that it was okay to just let the irrigation water flow out without pulling it back into the syringe as I had been doing.


Now I sometimes irrigate daily (when I see a lot of whote floaty wisps) - do that for a few days until I convince myself that I have been a "good girl"and then drift into skipping some days - maybe one or two in a row. All in all, the answer is probably an average of three to four times a week.

I still feel as if I can't be trusted to take proper care of myself (probably baseless in regard to the stoma and pouch) - took myself to the ER two weeks ago because I was sure that the ache in my left lower back was a kidney infection because I was incompentent in keeping my cath techinque and catheters "clean" - they did blood work. a UA (I warned them that I always will have bacteria in my urine) and a CT scan and sent me home on Cipro - three days later I realized that maybe the raised areas I was feeling in that same location were not due to my touching the area which had ached - and was diagnosed with a (mild) case of shingles - obviously totally unrelated to my voiding by self-cathing.

Sorry if this is a duplicate (sort of) if my original, funny only to me, post did appear. I just am not willing to give up irrigating yet since I heard the story of the young woman who was not told to irrigate and then had complications - I seem to remember she said that she now irrigates about three times a week or maybe every three days and has had no repeat problems.

Susan

I just want to point out that you will ALWAYS have mucus in your urine, it is just how much that becomes the problem. The reason that there is mucus is because one the functions of bowel is to make mucus. Even though your bowel is now your new bladder it does not know it is no longer bowel and continues to do its job of making mucus. After 15 years mine still makes mucus though not as much as it did in the beginning. If you do not irrigate then the mucus can build up, sit in there and bacteria can start to grow and then an infection takes hold. Also if too much is in there it can be a source of leaking for some. Did your doctor or ET nurse tell you how often you should be irrigating? How are you doing now?