Active clinical trials for "Fecal Incontinence"

Compare the effects of a combination of colesevelam and clonidine to placebo on bowel symptoms in patients with urge or combined type of FI.

Multi-center, prospective, within-subject control, open label clinical trial to evaluate the durability of the safety and effectiveness of the Eclipse™ System after 3 and 12 months of use.

Anal incontinence is a significant public health problem estimated to affect 7-15% of women in the United States. Traditional rehabilitation strategies include biofeedback and Kegel exercises for pelvic floor muscle strengthening, but this strategy does not incorporate strategies for resistance training that are known to cause muscle strengthening and hypertrophy in other muscles in the body. This study aims to investigate whether a novel pelvic floor resistance exercise program will increase pelvic floor muscle strength and improve anal incontinence and has the potential to impact rehabilitation strategies for the millions of women affected anal incontinence.

The goal of this study is to obtain data about the effectiveness, reach, adoption, and implementation potential of an innovative, combined urinary/bowel continence workshop through a randomized controlled trial in six Wisconsin communities. This three-session workshop is based on proven principles of behavior change addressing urinary and bowel continence self-management and health education and has been developed specifically for administration to women age 50 and older in senior centers. We hypothesize that workshop participants will experience improvements in urinary and bowel incontinence symptoms, will have increased levels of care-seeking and self-efficacy for these conditions, and will maintain the self-management strategies taught in the workshop 3 months following completion of the workshop. We further hypothesize that this workshop will reach its intended target population (independent senior women with incontinence) and will improve their mental health by destigmatizing the condition of incontinence.

Faecal incontinence occurs when a person passes faeces (stools) without the usual control. It is a distressing condition that is actually very common although under-reported because of embarrassment. Milder symptoms may be managed by treatments such as dietary change, drugs and bowel retraining, but many patients still resort to surgery to improve symptoms. Although several operations exist to treat incontinence e.g. those aiming to repair damaged anal sphincter muscles, it is now clear that these often have poor results. Two relatively new treatments called sacral nerve stimulation (SNS) and percutaneous tibial nerve stimulation (PTNS) involve sending pulses of electricity to the nerves controlling the bowel and muscles of the anus (anal sphincter). SNS does this by inserting electrodes in the lower back just above the tailbone and connecting them to an implanted electrical stimulator which is buried in the buttock and acts a bit like a heart pacemaker. SNS is a relatively well-established treatment in specialist centres, which has been used for over 10 years. It has been shown in studies to be successful for faecal incontinence achieving some improvement in at least three quarters of patients. In Europe, this procedure is fast becoming first treatment offered when non-surgical treatments fail. Nevertheless, SNS is not a miracle cure for all, requiring 2 operations, with potential complications and expensive equipment (> £10,000 approx). PTNS is a newer treatment, which involves electrically stimulating a nerve at the ankle, using a very small needle, as an outpatient (a bit like acupuncture). This sends signals back to the spine region to try and improve symptoms of faecal incontinence. Since this is a newer treatment, fewer studies have been performed to quantify how successful it is, but early results of PTNS suggest that it may be as good as SNS. If this is true, this is very important because it is much less invasive and considerably cheaper than SNS (equipment £500 per patient). This project will for the first time determine how effective PTNS is in the treatment of patients with faecal incontinence, by comparing it to sham (fake stimulation). This study is a properly designed clinical trial of 212 patients in at least 14 UK Specialist Centres.. The results of this trial will lead to direct benefits for patients and the NHS.

Persistent fecal incontinence (FI) after anorectal malformations (ARM) is a common occurence. During the last two decades perianal injection therapy has emerged as an option for treating patients with FI due to other causes than ARMs. The studies done on different implants have always expempted patients with ARM which has led to ARM being a formal contraindication for treatment with perianal injection therapy. The study aims to treat patients with persistent FI after ARM with perianal injection of NASHA/Dx (Solesta®) and follow them with Clinical examination and questionnaires up to 18 months post treatment.

Shafik and colleagues were the first to report the use of posterior tibial nerve stimulation (PTNS) for FI, and they documented improved continence after 4 weeks course. Subsequent studies documented percutaneous and transcutaneous PTNS as effective methods for treatment of FI, with a short term reduction in incontinence episode by 50-80 %. Percutaneous PTNS (PPTNS) showed a greater effect than transcutaneous PTNS (TPTNS) and this may be assumed due to the presence of the stimulating electrode very close to the posterior tibial nerve. However, TPTNS is more preferable to percutaneous PTNS because of the concern about the insertion of a needle may result in stimulation that is sufficient to produce a neuromodulatory effect.

Indications for colostomy are rectal or anal cancer, diverticular disease, radiation enteritis, complex perirectal fistulas, anorectal trauma, severe incontinence, motility and functional disorders. It is frequently required in critically ill patients who may not be able to tolerate a laparotomy. Laparoscopic-assisted colostomy is an alternative method for colostomy without laparotomy, but require general anesthesia. Additionally, percutaneous anterior colopexy under colonocopic control offers the possibility for improved and faster fixation of the anterior colonic wall to the anterior abdominal wall. The objective of this study is to evaluate the feasibility of performing fecal diversion with the help of a colonoscope and colopexy, without the additional morbidity of abdominal exploration.

The purpose of this feasibility study is to obtain preliminary safety and effectiveness information and develop procedural optimization for the Magnetic Anal Sphincter device (FENIX System) in reinforcement of anal sphincter function to treat severe fecal incontinence (FI).

The objective of this study is to obtain preliminary efficacy and safety data on the use of the LivSure System (now called the "Eclipse™ System") in women with fecal incontinence.