Progressing Pelvic Floor Exercises During Nose Blowing, Coughing and Sneezing

Progressing Pelvic Floor Exercises During Nose Blowing, Coughing and Sneezing

Many clinicians are aware of the basic pelvic floor retraining exercises for individuals with urinary incontinence and/or sacro-iliac joint pain syndromes.

Kegel exercises (imagining to hold the flow of urine) can be performed in lying, four-point kneeling, neutral sitting or standing.

The gentle, sub-maximal contractions associated with the Kegel exercises need to be progressively increased from 10 to 30 to 60 seconds. However once the basic exercises are mastered, nose blowing, coughing, sneezing and laughing all need retraining in a similar manner.

The patient is trained to perform a gentle transversus abdominis and pelvic floor muscle contraction and then instructed to simultaneously perform the action of nose blowing. This nose-blowing pattern needs to be exercised 5-6 times repeatedly twice a day.

Coughing, sneezing and laughing require much stronger and faster abdominal and pelvic floor muscle contractions; therefore they may be incorporated only once the ?nose blowing? is mastered.

In all of these expiratory patterns the patient must report of awareness of vaginal tightening the entire time.

Basic pelvic floor retraining exercises and progressions are clearly described and demonstrated in the APTEI Video/Book program, ?The Sacro-iliac Joint (Part I)?.

Posted on: April 12, 2004

Categories: SI & Pelvis