Somebody help me with overnight catheter!!

[EmilieR91]

Hi all,
My dd has Spina bifida and has urinary incontinence. She catheterises intermittently and wears a pull up during the day, but recently we've been told that she needs to have a catheter overnight. It is a disposable catheter and leg bag which you just tape in place and throw away in the morning.
It's not working...The wee goes into the bag (just now had 200mls) but her bed is absolutely soaking wet every night and I'm constantly changing it. I can't put the catheter in any better or more securely than it is. Does anybody have any experience of this or can anybody suggest why this
might be??!! Thanks so much!

[Piehunter]

Sounds like she's bypassing the catheter? You can do this while still getting some coming through into the bag. Can be a number of things, constipation, wrong size catheter, bladder spasms.. Or could it be leaking from the connection to bag? I assume it's an indwelling overnight and has a balloon, that's definitely inflated correctly?

[EmilieR91]

Ah well this is the thing...its just a Foley catheter that's held in place with some tape! Nothing indwelling. No ballon. I think the catheter size maybe wrong. It's definitely not coming from tha connection. Can you get catheters with balloons that you can put in and take out daily??

[Piehunter]

Oh how bizarre! Catheters with no balloon aren't meant to be left in, just used for in/out purposes. I use a cd10 for intermittent but an indwelling I have a 12, the balloon keeps it in the correct place. I don't know about removing it/inserting daily but I can't see why not if you're intermittently cathing the insertion shouldn't be a problem? But having only had indwelling inserted by medical professionals I'm a bit unsure on that. If it's leaking it does seem like it's probably the wrong size which would be a bigger factor with no balloon. Can you contact continence nurse for advice?

[lougle]

You can't use a catheter with no balloon overnight?? The balloon does two jobs: 1) hold the catheter in place and 2) make sure that the urine goes into the catheter and doesn't leak (bypass). Are you sure you are not meant to be putting some water in the balloon overnight?