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Modern Biofeedback Training:
InContiNet was 10 Years Old
on October 15, 2005!

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"The Empire
Strikes Back"
 -- a new series of critical investigative reports on the efforts of the "Medical-Industrial Complex" to circumvent the effect of the US Public Health Service's Guideline on the treatment of urinary incontinence in adults.  For a mere $25,000 (first year cost) you can avoid the inconvenience of learning to do Kegel Exercises! 

More Critical Reviews
We are pleased to present the first of many "critical reviews" of incontinence literature. This series will examine in detail current and popular publications which have been or may be expected to be influential in the field. Opposing viewpoints will gladly be considered for publication.

What's the Best Treatment for Incontinence? Biofeedback or Electrical Stimulation? Home Training or Office Systems? How can you compare Apples and Oranges? One method is to convert everyone's data to Dr. Burgio's "Symptom Reduction Rate". The results are graphically displayed and explained in this new essay.

Just how effective IS Biofeedback in the Treatment of Urinary and Fecal Incontinence? After years of being "out of print", the 1988 study by Perry, Hullett & Bolinger has been edited and reprinted here. When everything is done just right, symptom reduction rates of over 99 percent were obtained in an average of 4.3 out-patient office visits.

30 Years of Research:
  this crude device (above) was the first vaginal EMG sensor used in pelvic muscle research in 1975.  See the evolution of sensors in our newest addition, "A Pictorial History of the Insertable Sensor" (picthist.htm).  Pictures of three Perry research devices from the 1980s have recently been posted as well.  

Dr. John Perry, a 30-year veteran of Pelvic Muscle Biofeedback, is now offering intensive on-line "mentoring" for the new "Pelvic Muscle Dysfunction" Certification announced by BCIA. 

Email, fax, scanned attachments, and live face to face "Cam2Cam" services  will be used to give private feedback on a Candidate's interventions and progress with patients. 

                                     see more....

Medicare’s Brave New World of Incontinence Treatment

Under new regulations, Kegel’s Perineometer will not be reimbursed, but failure at Kegel Exercises is now required.  Medicare has just institutionalized a new treatment protocol that has never been the subject of research or public discussion.  Reprinted from Biofeedback Newsmagazine.  

AAPB Biofeedback Experts issue rebuttal to Mullally's AAN attack on the  effectiveness and value of biofeedback in the treatment of headaches.  W. J. Mullally, MD -- a neurologist who has never published on headaches or biofeedback -- was quoted extensively by Reuters Health in May after he presented an abstract of a research paper that even today hasn't been written, let alone accepted for publication in any journal.  See headache.htm for the experts' response. 

New Study Shows Popular Drugs No Match For Biofeedback in Treating OverActive Bladder. 
Despite tremendous media hype, a new study by several of the most famous people in urology has shown that pharmacological treatments for OAB simply don't match the superior results obtained by even minimalist biofeedback.  

Fecal Incontinence:
Now that Medicare is covering biofeedback for urinary incontinence, we are getting a lot of requests for information about the status of fecal incontinence and constipation treatments.  Here is a recent article about research evidence.

"My Close Encounter With The Electric Chair", a light-hearted but serious look at the new electromagnetic chair that is being hyped for the treatment of incontinence.  

 "Ask Dr. P." - reprints of formerly private email questions submitted to the webmaster. These have been made "anonymous" so that they could be shared with a wider audience. You may find your personal question has already been asked -- and answered!

Critical Reviews of (parts of) the AHCPR Guideline on Urinary Incontinence in Adults. Although we welcome the Guideline, there are some serious errors in the section on Biofeedback, which are discussed in detail. And the section on Electrical Stimulation is downright misleading. Check them out!

Webmaster Wins AAPB Service Award

 John D. Perry, PhD (left) receives The Sheila M. Adler Award from AAPB President Doil Montgomery, PhD at the group's annual convention in Raleigh, NC in April 2001.  The award, "in recognition of outstanding contributions to the Association for Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback", was based on Perry's two-year effort to obtain Medicare reimbursement for biofeedback for urinary incontinence. 

Our real-time mailing list, Incontinence, is a standard email "broadcast" list; click on the name for instructions to join. Whenever anyone posts email to "Incontinence" it is instantly distributed to the several hundred members. Also all "what's new" announcements for this website are posted there first.  Note: This new list replaces our original lists and now features both digest format, read it on the web only, and archives.  

Good News:
  

The original fria™ OTC home trainer (above) has been replaced by an improved model called "Myself™", which adds automatic scale selection and other new features but sells for $30 LESS!   Now pay only $99.95 for real biofeedback!
(Click on Cart:)
 
 

"When is Prostatitis NOT Prostatitis?" - A popular essay reprinted from the Winter, 1999 issue of Biofeedback Newsmagazine, published by the Association for Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback.  

  Major Medicare Victory!   National Coverage for Biofeedback for Incontinence is now Mandated by HCFA! Click here for a one-page summary.   Click here for links to all the official documents, position papers, and a summary of this two-year-long battle.   Click on this link for the official Medicare announcement on their website.  And Click Here for a critical Commentary by Dr. Perry.  

"Cramps Really Are Cramps" -  the treatment of dysmenorrhea with EMG biofeedback.  Data collected nearly 22 years ago is finally committed to written form.  

"Is Electrical Stimulation a form of 'Behavioral Therapy'?"   An essay from the our email list is reproduced here for your consideration.   The AHCPR says it is, but are they accurate? 

Good News! 
Dr. Howard Glazer has published, in the highly respected Journal of Reproductive Medicine (September, 1999), a paper  which shows that sEMG, using vaginal sensors, has both "reliability" and "predictive validity" for stress and urge incontinence.  Incontinence clinicians have known this for years, but no one bothered to prove it before now!  [For Glazer's famous 1995 paper on biofeedback treatment of vulvodynia, click here.]

"The Ghost in the Box"

 by Shellenberger and Green, has just been published  by InContiNet.  This 1986 masterpiece changed the way we look at biofeedback.  It has been out of print for several years, but it is now only a click away!  This book is REQUIRED READING for anyone doing EMG biofeedback for incontinence and pelvic muscle dysfunctions!

Do YOU need more professional training to treat patients with Pelvic Muscle Dysfunctions?  Click on the link to see the latest continuing education offerings, courtesy of The Prometheus Group!

Also: We've made some progress...on the Perry Institute On-Line Continence Training Program. Click here to see the course OUTLINE, or here to Pre-register for it.

"Handbook of Perineometry" posted to this Website
We are pleased to announce the posting of the full text of the 6th Edition (1987) of this famous Handbook, the last in a series of annual revisions to the FDA-required labeling which accompanied the original (sterilizable) Perry™ brand EMG perineometer sensors. The Handbook includes a "clinical practice" section (Chapter 2) which is still of interest to practitioners treating pelvic muscle dysfunctions. Absent the on-line Perry Institute training course (see below), this is still the only and best source of free information about pelvic muscle rehabilitation on the Internet! If you have only recently become aware of the use of EMG biofeedback to treat pelvic muscle disorders, you ought to read this historic document. No pictures, but very interesting!