So, what kind of operation situation needs a catheter? What's it like to insert a catheter?

First of all, to popularize science, urethral catheterization is to use a catheter, insert the catheter into the bladder from the urethral orifice, and then connect a drainage bag to drain the urine. Routine indwelling catheter is needed for major surgery, preoperative water and electrolyte disorder or shock, lower abdomen and pelvic surgery.

Purpose of surgical catheterization:

Monitoring urine volume:

Anesthesiologists need to determine the amount of fluid replacement according to the amount of urine. If the urine volume is small and the color is dark, it means that the fluid replacement is not enough and more fluid replacement is needed. This situation is mainly seen in major surgery, emergency surgery, or patients have been in shock before surgery, or water and electrolyte imbalance has occurred.

Prevent bladder rupture:

After general anesthesia or spinal anesthesia, patients cannot urinate on their own. If the operation takes a long time and there is a lot of fluid replacement during the operation, the catheter should be put down to prevent urine from bursting the bladder. Under normal circumstances, if the operation time exceeds three or four hours, it is necessary to leave a catheter.

Emptying bladder is beneficial to operation;

Before the lower abdomen or pelvic surgery, it is necessary to empty the bladder, because bladder swelling will affect the operation, block the surgical field of vision, and may also cause collateral damage. Therefore, cesarean section, rectal cancer surgery, sigmoid cancer surgery and laparoscopic appendectomy all recommend preoperative indwelling catheter.

Is indwelling catheter uncomfortable?

There are two catheter insertion times.

The first one is to insert a catheter in the morning before the operation.

The second chapter is about inserting catheter after surgical anesthesia.

It must be uncomfortable to insert a catheter before the operation, because the catheter has to pass through the urethra. Some people have a thin urethra, so they will feel pain during the process of inserting a catheter, but they will gradually adapt. After the operation, I didn't feel much.

I don't feel anything when inserting after anesthesia, because I have fallen asleep, but when I wake up after anesthesia, many people will be very intolerant of the catheter and feel very uncomfortable.

Both methods have advantages and disadvantages.

Indwelling catheters can also cause some discomfort. Some patients have symptoms of urethral irritation, always have the feeling of urination, or feel dysuria. Catheter indwelling time should not be too long, which is easy to cause urinary tract infection. If conditions permit, the catheter should be removed as soon as possible.

Some people say, don't you pull it out during anesthesia?

The problem is that the patient is under anesthesia after the operation. After pulling out the catheter, I can't pee myself, and the rise is even worse. Especially for special brain surgery, it may take 2-3 days after operation to completely unplug the catheter.

In fact, there is a third way of insertion, which is to use some anesthetic first and intubate without complete anesthesia. The research shows that the intubation effect is the best at this time, which has little influence on the patient's heart rate and blood pressure, and has better postoperative tolerance. In addition, the female urethra is shorter and the pain of urethral catheterization is better.