Urinary catheters are widely used by persons who have problems with respect to voluntary emptying of the urinary bladder or persons who need temporary assistance in emptying the urinary bladder. A wide variety of different types of urinary catheters is available to individuals or medical professionals, which are specifically designed for a specific use, such as intermittent catheters or permanent/long term catheters, such as foley catheters.
Intermittent catheters are widely used by individuals who are paralyzed, such as para- and/or tetraplegics, where the urinary bladder is emptied in regular intervals and the individuals are often capable of inserting the intermittent catheter without assistance. The use of permanent or long-term catheters is usually linked to an individual's hospital stay or at least where the individual is under regular observation of medical professionals, as permanent catheters are not well adapted for self catheterization as they are usually very flexible and have a larger diameter than intermittent catheters and thus are usually inserted by medical professionals under relatively clean or even sterile conditions.
Urinary catheters are generally known to comprise a catheter tube for providing a fluid pathway from the urinary bladder to the outside of the body, a rounded tip for smoothing the insertion of the catheter into the urinary channel and drainage eyes for facilitating the entering of urine into the catheter tube.
The most common method of producing urinary catheters, especially intermittent catheters, is to extrude the catheter tube in a plastic material and subsequently provide the catheter with a tip and drainage eyes. Catheters that are manufactured using the extrusion process have a uniform and constant diameter on both the external and the internal surface from end to end, and therefore have a constant thickness of material throughout the entire length of the catheter tube.