Urinary Incontinence: An Inevitable Part of Aging?

Swenson C, Solway E, Singer D, Kirch M, Kullgren J, Malani P. Urinary incontinence: An inevitable part of aging? University of Michigan National Poll on Healthy Aging. November 2018.

Overall, one in three older women who experienced incontinence (34%) said they spoke to their doctor about urinary leakage (28% for those age 50–64 and 44% among those age 65–80). Women who viewed incontinence as a problem or felt embarrassed by it were more likely to have sought medical advice. Furthermore, women who saw three or more doctors in the past year were more likely to have brought up incontinence with at least one of their physicians.

Women most commonly addressed urinary incontinence with their primary care physician (49%), while 24% talked to an obstetrician/gynecologist and 22% spoke to a urologist.

What prevents women from seeking medical treatment for urinary incontinence? Among women with incontinence, two in three (66%) said they had not spoken to their doctor because they felt the problem was not that bad, 23% said they had other things to discuss, and 22% did not see urinary incontinence as a health problem. Another 15% of women said their doctor had not asked about urinary incontinence, 10% were uncomfortable discussing urinary leakage, and 4% did not think the doctor could help. About half of women (53%) said they find it easier to talk about urine leakage with a female physician.

Disponível Em: <https://www.healthyagingpoll.org/>