Pelvic floor exercises for men guide

The pelvic floor muscles

• The pelvic floor muscles are just inside your body. They are attached between the bottom of your spine (coccyx) and the bone between your legs (pubic bone)
• These muscles support the bladder (where urine is stored) and the bowels. They help to control when you pass urine and empty your bowels. They also assist with good sexual function
• These muscles should be firm and strong. If they are weak, they will not provide the support and control that they should.

How to exercise your pelvic floor muscles

You can do the exercises lying on your back with your knees bent or sitting in the chair with your knees slightly apart.

• Try to squeeze your pelvic floor muscles by imagining you are trying to stop yourself passing urine and stop yourself passing wind
• Hold the squeeze. This is a slow squeeze. (Eventually you are aiming to be able to hold the squeeze for 10 seconds)
• Now squeeze again but let go straight away. This is a fast squeeze
• You are aiming to eventually be able to do 10 slow squeezes and 10 fast squeezes
• You should do this three times a day. It is really important that you concentrate when doing these exercises. No multi tasking
• Remember when doing your exercises do not hold your breath, squeeze your buttocks or squeeze your legs together.

How will I know I’m doing the exercises correctly?

Your specialist continence practitioner will explain the exercises to you. They will also suggest a rectal examination to check your exercise technique and develop a personal exercise plan for you. However, there are also ways you can check your technique yourself.

1. Place your fingertips against the skin just behind your scrotum. When you squeeze, you should feel the muscles tighten and lift up away from your fingers. Your scrotum should lift slightly and the base of your penis should move towards your abdomen.
2. While passing urine and towards the end of the stream, squeeze your pelvic floor muscles as described. If you can stop the flow of urine you are squeezing correctly. Only do this once to find the muscles, because doing it regularly may interfere with normal bladder emptying.

It is very important you are squeezing and relaxing the muscles correctly. If you squeeze incorrectly, you may cause more damage. If you are unsure or need more help, contact the continence team for further advice and support.

How will I remember to do the exercises?

• It can be hard to remember to do the exercises but you should persevere
• To help you remember, you could try keeping an exercise diary, setting an alarm on your phone or using an app such as Squeezy.

Post micturition dribble

If you experience dribbling of urine after you have passed urine, you may find the following advice helps:

• After passing urine, gently massage behind your scrotum. Massage from back to front.

How will I know if I’m getting better?

It can take up to three months before you see an improvement:

• You should become more aware of your pelvic floor muscles as they become stronger. You may also notice that you have better control over your bladder and/or bowels
• If there is no improvement after three months, you should seek further help. 

Pelvic floor muscle exercise programme

Do both exercises three times per day.

Tighten your back passage as though you were stopping wind and urine escaping, then do either long or short squeezes as detailed below.

Pelvic floor muscle exercise diary

Our patients matter

Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust listens and responds to patients and their carers to help improve the services we deliver.

If you have any comments, compliments or concerns you can speak with a member of staff or contact our Patient Advice and LiaisonService (PALS) and Complaints Team.

Telephone: 0151 471 2377 Freephone: 0800 328 2941 Email: palsandcomplaints@merseycare.nhs.uk