Urinary retention

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Urinary retention is inability to urinate or incomplete emptying of the bladder.

People who have incomplete emptying of the bladder may have urinary frequency or urinary incontinence.
If the person can urinate, doctors measure the amount of urine left in the bladder after the person urinates.
Doctors use a catheter to remove urine from the bladder and then treat the cause.

(See also Control of Urination.)
People may retain urine because bladder muscle contractions are impaired, the opening of the bladder is blocked (bladder outlet obstruction), or there is a lack of coordination between bladder contraction and relaxation of the muscle that closes the opening of the bladder (urinary sphincter). Urinary retention is more common among men because prostate enlargement such as that due to benign prostatic hyperplasia may cause narrowing of the channel that carries urine out of the body (urethra).
Drugs, especially those with anticholinergic effects, such as antihistamines and some antidepressants, can cause urinary retention in both men and women. Other causes include a hard lump of stool that fills the rectum and presses on the urethra (fecal impaction) and neurogenic bladder in people with diabetes, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson disease, or prior surgery of the pelvis that damages bladder nerves.