About Us

The Pelvic Floor Unit is publicly funded to see people from southern New South Wales. They are referred to us by local doctors, specialists and other health professionals. We see about 9500 visits per year. We work closely with doctors from other specialty areas eg. urologists, colorectal specialists and gastroenterologists.

Bladder problems affect at least 33% of the population. These problems affect people’s quality of life and are a reason for an admission to a nursing home, yet the success of earlier treatment is very good.

Besides seeing patients in the Pelvic Floor Unit, the role of the senior medical staff includes providing services to women who wish to attend the private medicine framework. As academic members of the Department of Urogynaecology, Senior medical staff also teach undergraduates in the Unit.

Our department has very close ties with the Continence Foundation of Australia (CFA). The CFA aims to foster the promotion of knowledge about incontinence in the community, to improve awareness of available treatments and to promote research into the causes of specific types of incontinence.  Dr Karantanis, Dr Te West and Dr Zhuoran Chen and speak regularly at their Annual Conference.

The Pelvic Floor Unit is staffed by:

• three senior urogynaecologists (see FAQ’s for definition of urogynaecologist)
• a urogynaecology fellow
• a gynaecology registrar
• four specialist nurse continence advisors
• two senior research nurses
• an anorectal physiologist
• two pelvic floor physiotherapist
• four administrative assistants
• two urologists (part time)