title: The prevalence of urinary incontinence and its influence on the quality of life in women from an urban Swedish population.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To assess the prevalence of urinary incontinence and its influence on the quality of life.
  
  
  METHODS
  A random sample of every fourth woman aged > or =20 years resident in a primary health care district of the city of Göteborg was obtained from the population register (n=2911). The women were invited by letter to complete a questionnaire concerning urinary incontinence. The women were also requested to assess their quality of life using a visual analogue scale.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The overall response rate was 77%. The prevalence of urinary incontinence increased (p<0.001) in a linear fashion from 3% in the cohort 20-29 years to 32 % in the cohort of women aged > or =80 years. The proportion of women suffering from stress incontinence decreased (p<0.001) with increasing age, while the proportion of women suffering from urge and mixed incontinence increased (p<0.01) with increasing age. Women with stress incontinence had a greater body weight and had given birth to a greater number of children compared to continent women. There was, however, in this respect no difference between women with urge incontinence and continent women. Women with urinary incontinence reported a poorer quality of life compared to continent women (p<0.01). Women with urge incontinence and women with mixed incontinence reported a poorer quality of life compared to women with stress incontinence (p<0.05). Only 6% of the women from this population had sought medical attention for urinary incontinence.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Although urinary incontinence was a prevalent condition, particularly among the elderly and had a negative influence on the quality of life, only a small number of women had sought medical care.
authors.affiliation: Department of Primary Health Care, University of Göteborg, Sweden.
authors.forename: Z
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Simeonova
authors.forename: I
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Milsom
authors.forename: A M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Kullendorff
authors.forename: U
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Molander
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Bengtsson
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D015995:Prevalence; D011788:Quality of Life; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D013548:Sweden / Q000453:epidemiology; D014504:Urban Health; D014550:Urinary Incontinence, Stress / Q000453:epidemiology*