Weird Situation - Bladder Seemed Fully Distended But...

I only self cathed once when I was learning. Nurse Mary measured the amount in my bladder using a scanner and it came up with 70 mL. Then when I self cathed only 20 mL came out. She was surprised and I was too. I asked the urologist about it later and he said that bladder scanners can be inaccurate. He also said that if my prostate is pushing into my bladder it can create a valley where urine will pool. It's unclear if self cathing can remove this urine that lays in the valley.

I have bladder diverticulum so pooling is definitely a possibility. Surprisingly, no symptomatic UTI's to date. I estimated about 50 ML. I can measure it next time. 15 minutes later, I voided some more but was drinking quite a bit. Get up 2 to 3 times a night to urinate, and not much comes out - very weak stream, very low bladder pressure. If I drink a good amount during the day and drink it fast (especially caffeine), then not only do I get a strong urge to urinate, I do so frequently with a decent stream that has a secondary dribble stream for some reason - sometimes every 10 minutes for an hour. I now basically avoid caffeine. Sometimes my stream will be ok. After cystoscopy, uroflowmetry was measured at 7ML, as low as 3 ML, but bladder scanner said I fully voided so..

I recommend you start keeping a journal. It's actually pretty easy once you get used to it. It only adds about 5 to 10 seconds to the total time I spend in the bathroom during urination. Measuring at night is important too. Just pee into the beaker and use a flashlight to see how many ml (don't turn on the light). You can get a lot of information from keeping a journal. I summarize each day as one line item in an Excel spreadsheet.

When you say uroflowmetry was measured at 7 ML do you mean a maximum urine flowrate of 7 ML/sec? If you want to approximately monitor maximum flowrate at home, you can buy a device called Uflow Meter, which is sold on Amazon for about $11.

It really depends on how data driven you are. I am quite data driven and even have my own bladder scanner.

Yes, max ML was 7.. I've been looking for bladder scanners online, but can't seem to find them for any kind of reasonable price. If you can PM me where to look, that would be much appreciated. I will check out the Uflow meter - thanks!

I got mine from eBay. Be sure to consider whether you can use it by yourself. For example the BVI 9400 requires that you look at the probe to see if the arrows are pointing in towards the center. If you are laying down and pressing the probe into your abdomen, I don't think you'll be able to see the arrows. However, I've never tried that bladder scanner, so perhaps it is possible. It is the bladder scanner used predominantly at Kaiser.

Also on eBay, be careful about what is supplied. They usually tell you what is included but don't necessarily list what is missing. For example, sometimes battery packs or adapter are missing. Sometimes the probe isn't included.

Finally, once you get a scanner, realize that it might take some time to figure out how to use it. I've had mine for 4 months and am still working on it. I think it is reading high, but I'm not really sure. It definitely reads higher than the hospital/uro scanners. But I'm also realizing that a lot of technicians don't really know how to use the scanners correctly. For me I might get a reading of 80 mL up to 140 mL after I urinate. Which one is correct? Normally you take the higher reading, but with my scanner, I can see the images used to calculate the volume. Often they look weird or off. So, I'm still working with it; but am getting better.

If self cathing pretty much empties your bladder, then you can use that to help figure out how well you are using your scanner.I haven't tried that yet, but will probably in the near future.

Also jimjames has a thread on this site on Bladder Scanners. Worth looking at. Jim also probably has the definitive thread on this site on self cathing.