If you suffer from incontinence, you may know there are medications that can help you control your symptoms. But did you know some other types of medications may actually be making your symptoms worse? Here are five common types of medications that studies have shown can exacerbate urine leakage:

• Sleeping pills and sedatives: Both of these medications cause deep relaxation and make you less likely to respond to normal signals that your bladder is full. The result: Nighttime incontinence and a wet bed.
• Antidepressants: Many antidepressant drugs can interfere with bladder contraction, making it more difficult to completely empty your bladder and resulting in urge incontinence.
• Narcotic pain relievers: Like antidepressants, narcotic drugs can also interfere with your bladder’s ability to contract and even make you less likely to recognize that you need to urinate.
• Diuretics: Also called water pills, diuretics are taken by many people with heart problems to reduce excess fluid and salt in the body and make it easier for the heart to pump. They work by stimulating the kidneys, which in turn fills your bladder, often resulting in incontinence due to overactive bladder.
• High blood pressure medications: Alpha blockers are used to help control high blood pressure by dilating blood vessels. They can also be prescribed to men who have enlarged prostates. In addition to dilating blood vessels, alpha blockers relax the muscles in the neck of the bladder, resulting in urine leakage for many women who take the pills.

Does this mean you should stop taking these medications? Absolutely not! Never change your medication or dosage without consulting your doctor. What it does mean is that if you suffer from incontinence, you might want to discuss alternative treatments with your doctor so you can see if a change helps reduce or eliminate your incontinence symptoms.