Urinary Tract Infections and Treatment Options

Dr. Dean Elterman, MD, MSc, FRCSC Urological Surgeon

Duration: 2 minute 50 seconds

One of the big risk factors actually for getting UTIs is being dehydrated. There have been studies showing that even if you drink a little bit more water you can actually reduce your recurrence of infections. There are non antibiotic medications out there, such as D-Mannos, or hip raid and ketamine. These are over the counter medications that can be used to treat UTI’s.

Cranberries are another one that people have a lot of questions about. So there is an ingredient this active ingredient found in cranberries, called Proanthocyanidin, or also known as PAC. And it's this PAC that's really important in preventing the bacteria from clinging on to the bladder wall. There's very good evidence that it works. The main issue is that you need to have a very high concentration of PAC in whatever you're taking. So, drinking cranberry juice alone, actually doesn't have enough PAC to have any preventative properties or curative properties. Even cranberry tablets do not have enough PAC in them to be effective. You need to look on the label and look for a minimum of 36 milligrams of PAC.

When it comes to UTI’s, one of the important things is that people should have a doctor send out what's called a urine culture. If you simply just do a very preliminary dip of your urine or urineanalysis, it doesn't actually tell us whether there's a bacteria or what type of bacteria, and what type of antibiotics to give.

To really document whether you have a proven UTIs you really need to have what's called a urine culture and sensitivity. From a Urologists perspective, this is the most important thing because if you just do the preliminary tests, you may not be actually treating a UTI and be giving the wrong antibiotic.

It’s important to remember that not all UTIs need to be treated. The main advantage of giving antibiotics is that it shortens the amount of time that you're going to have symptoms. It lessens the severity of the infection, and you'll start to feel better sooner. But most healthy adults, will ultimately clear a UTI with without antibiotics. The idea is to try to use the minimum amount of antibiotics. So, in women who have what's called an uncomplicated UTI, straightforward infection will often just give them three days of antibiotics that can be sufficient. For men, they may require longer, for example, seven days, and some women may require longer as well.

Presenter: Dr. Dean Elterman, Urologist, Toronto, ON

Local Practitioners: Urologist