Development and evaluation of a pelvic floor exercise multimedia CD-ROM in women aged 40-60 years old and pregnancy

Abstract

Urinary incontinence is one of the major health problems in menopause women and pregnancy. Incontinence in menopause can occur from several causes. Activities such as coughing, sneezing, laughing or stairs increase intra-abdominal pressure and result in leakage especially in those with pelvic floor muscles weakness. Feeling of anxiety and embarrassment often occur in this population.  Correct knowledge and understanding of pelvic floor muscles exercise are essential in women.  The aim of this study was to produce pelvic floor exercise multimedia for continence women age between 40-60 years old and pregnancy.  The length of multimedia was 12 .20 minutes.  Knowledge was compared between pre-post training and control and training groups in pregnancy at baseline, immediately after viewing the multimedia and at 12 weeks follow up. There were 82 volunteers at the beginning but 79 (96.3 %) completed the study.  This included 59 continence women, and 20 pregnant women.  The results showed that knowledge related to urinary incontinence and pelvic floor exercise was improved after viewing the multimedia and was able to maintain for 12 weeks in training groups.  Volunteers were satisfied with the program and able to use of the multimedia as a teaching tool for others women.  In conclusion, the multimedia produce in this study can help to improve knowledge of urinary incontinence of women age 40-60 years and pregnancy.  Although the topic of urinary incontinence is difficult to understand, producing a multimedia for delivering the knowledge will help these women to teach others in the community, improve the quality of pelvic floor muscles, prevent urinary incontinence problem and promote and fulfill the quality of life of these women.

Keywords:  Pelvic floor muscle, VCD,  Pelvic floor exercises, Urinary incontinence,  Pregnancy