Traditional Treatments
Many urologists, though in most cases sympathetic, do not understand IC. They do not know what causes it and certainly do not know how to treat it. Often it is misdiagnosed because the symptoms are not standard. Many more than the approximately 700,000 people in the U.S. reported to have IC probably have the disease. Diagnosis is confirmed by performing a cystoscopy, the insertion of a flexible tube and viewing device into the urethra, which together with hydrodistension (filling the bladder with water) can detect glomurations (hemorrhages) or ulcers on the bladder wall.
Most of the medications administered by the medical profession mask the symptoms and, in some cases, can cause severe side effects. Visit many of the support networks associated with IC and you will find hundreds of desperate women grasping for a solution, for anything that might ease their misery. Many people forced onto disability because they cannot work. Women left by husbands and boyfriends because they are unable to contribute to the relationship. Women whose idea of success is that they can finally self-catheterize in order to instill some chemical into their bladder once a week or once a month.
Apart from some of these treatments being barbaric, there are numerous cases where the patient’s health has been irreparably damaged by the treatment. Sometimes the treatment seems to help, but often it is temporary and when administered again and again it ceases to work.