A study conducted by BOECKH-BEHRENS W.-U./SCHÄFFER, G., at University of Bayreuth (2002) shows that EMS can be used to treat urinary incontinence and confirms earlier studies conducted in 1987, 1990, 2000 and 2001.
Objective
The aim of this study was to indentify the effects of EMS-training on urinary incontinence.
Methods
49 subjects who suffered from back pain were examined in this study. With the help of pre and post questionnaires (GAUDENZ 1979) the existence, the type and the intensity of incontinence disorders was identified. 17 subjects (15 women, 2 men) with an average age of 47 years had a mostly light to medium type of urinary incontinence. The subjects performed two EMS-training sessions per week with a duration of 45 minutes (a total of 10 sessions) with following training parameters: Impulse duration 4 s, impulse interval 2 s, frequency 80 Hz, rise time 0 s, impulse amplitude 350 μs. Every training session started with a warm-up period of 10-15 minutes in order to adapt to electrical stimulus and set the individual impulse intensity for training. Within the following guided training program (about 25 minutes) the subjects performed different static exercise positions. To cool down the subjects performed a 5 minute relaxation program with following parameters: Impulse duration 1 s, impulse interval 1 s, frequency 100 Hz, rise time 0 s, impulse amplitude 150 μs.
Results
64.7 % of the subjects showed an alleviation of urinary incontinence. 23.5 % were free of urinary incontinence afterwards, 24.4 % reported a reduction and 35.9 % showed no changes. These results are equal to the improvements reported after treatments of incontinence with specific local electromyostimulation-therapies (vgl. Eriksen 1987, Sebastio 2000, Salinas Casado 1990, Meyer, 2001).
Conclusion
The whole-body EMS-training offers an effective training method. EMS-training achieves therapeutic goals like the alleviation of incontinence and back pain disorders as well as preventive goals such as muscle gain, body shaping, improvements in mood, vitality, body stability and increase of the general performance.
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