Infection of the bladder in called cystitis. When it occurs after the first intercourse in a woman or after an intercourse following long period of sex-free interval, it is called Honeymoon cystitis. Cystitis occurs mainly due to movement of normal bacteria around the anus to the urethra and upward movement of the bacteria to the bladder. The infection of the bladder causes burning sensation during voiding, urgency and frequency in urination. There should not be any systemic symptoms associated with a simple cystitis, thus there is no fever or flank pain, however, suprapubic tenderness is not uncommon. Cystitis is a very common condition in women. Nearly half of women experience at least one episode of cystitis during their life, if lucky enough to not experience it again. Honeymoon cystitis however is not that common and occurs in as few as 4% of the women. Since the bacteria causing the infection reside around the woman anus, condoms have not shown to provide protection against cystitis formation although condoms can greatly decrease rate of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections.

Cystitis is not that common in men because of the lengthy urethra which makes it harder for the bacteria to move upward to the bladder. But if cystitis happens in a male there is a good chance that an underlying problem might exists.

One of the ways that you can prevent cystitis formation is by enhancing the natural body mechanism in getting rid of these bacteria by urination. Voiding after intercourse, drinking plenty of water and frequent urination can help preventing cystitis formation. Cranberry juice has been shown to protect urethra from bacterial sticking and can help in prevention of cystitis but not treatment of already happened cystitis.

The treatment is easy and quick. A short course of antibiotics can resolve the problem. But if you do not like to try drugs, you can wait for 48 hours to see if the body can resolve the infection by itself. However, use of urinary pain killers is not a good idea, relieving the pain and keeping the infection at the site is pretty bad and can lead to further extension of infection from the bladder to the kidney. If you are suffering from recurrent bouts of cystitis, after required medical investigations the doctor might prescribe you a daily low dose antibiotic to make sure that cystitis would not happen again.