Pelvic health before and after having a baby

Guests on today's podcast are Guilia Ciccolini and Samantha Vincent from our Pelvic Health Team at Hillingdon Hospital. They are talking about about perineal care, pelvic floor exercises and bowel and bladder care for new mums.

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Chapters

• 0:49 Perineal care and massage
• 5:32 Perineal care after birth
• 7:32 Pelvic floor exercises
• 8:39 Returning to exercise
• 9:33 Breastfeeding and exercise
• 10:17 Higher level athletes return to exercise
• 11:16 Bladder and bowel care

Transcript

Pelvic health after having a baby

Welcome to the latest in our series of antenatal podcasts at Hillingdon Hospitals. 

Today I’m am talking to Juilia Chiccolini and Samantha Vincent from our pelvic health team, who are going to talk to me about perineal care, pelvic floor exercises and bowel and bladder care.

Firstly, Giulia, could you please tell us what the perineum is and why it is so important to discuss it?

Guilia 

-          What the perineum is

-          What happens to it during birth (it can tear)

-          How you can avoid damage (massage)

-          Kind of tears to expect 

And what about after birth? How can mothers care for their perineum after birth?

Guilia

1.                   Advice to help to reduce and control pain in hospital and at home

2.                   Advice about washing

3.                   When to return to sex

4.                   In our previous podcast related to perineal massage, you mentioned that antenatal perineal massage is slightly different from scar massage. Could you please fill us in with more information?

5.                   if you experience any abnormal symptoms, get access to specialist healthcare professional by contacting….

And we have all heard about pelvic floor exercises, Samantha, can you tell us what they are and why they are important?

Sam

-          what pelvic floor exercises are, why they are important

-          pelvic floor exercise and how to do them

Lucy – should we all be doing our pelvic floor exercises or is this just for women before and after birth?

Guilia – yes we should!

Sam, a lot of women want to return to exercise as soon as possible postnatally, can you tell us the guidance about returning to exercise?

Sam

-          guidance about returning to exercise

-          circumstances when a mother should NOT return to exercise in these timeframes

-          breastfeeding impact on exercising?

Lucy - Is there any additional advice for mother’s who may be higher level athletes or consider themselves an advanced exerciser?

Sam -

Sam, can you tell us what you recommend as standard as bladder and bowel care?

1.                   Are there any bladder signs we should particularly look out for after birth which might mean that it hasn’t returned to working normally and what can the mother do?

2.                   Constipation is something which can be tricky both ante and postnatally, have you got any top tips for avoiding constipation in these periods?

Finally, are there any parting messages which you would like to say before we go?