Do future healthcare professionals have adequate knowledge about risk factors for stress urinary incontinence in women?

Joanna Witkoś,Magdalena Hartman-Petrycka

doi:10.1186/s12905-020-01124-0

Abstract

BackgroundStress urinary incontinence worsens living conditions as far as the occupational, social, mental, physical and sexual aspects of a woman’s life. Despite its real impact on the everyday lives of millions of women around the world, this problem is still disregarded and treated only as a discomfort associated with personal hygiene. Could this be due to negligence on the part of medical personnel in this matter and perhaps this lack of knowledge and proper information intended for women with stress urinary incontinence? Implementing educational activities to increase knowledge about urinary incontinence will translate into better educated women and earlier implementation of urinary incontinence treatment in the future. To properly educate women at risk of urinary incontinence, one needs to be familiar with the condition, in particular the risk factors for its development. The purpose of the study was to evaluate the degree of knowledge of students graduating from medical faculties have regarding risk factors for stress urinary incontinence in women and assess where the students’ knowledge of this problem came from.MethodsThe research involved 1581 final year students of medical faculties: nursing and midwifery (258), medicine (432), physiotherapy (402) and other medical (489). The author’s survey was used for the research. The chi2 test was used for analysis.ResultsStudents in faculties of nursing and midwifery, general medicine, physiotherapy, and other medical faculties could correctly list stress urinary incontinence risk factors in 88.8%, 81.7%, 74.4% and 51.9% of their answers respectively (p < 0.01). The most frequently mentioned source of knowledge about stress urinary incontinence was higher level education in 82.6%, 89.8%, 90.0% and 34.4% of the respective groups’ replies (p < 0.001).ConclusionsNursing and midwifery students had the greatest theoretical knowledge of stress urinary incontinence, and lesser knowledge was found among general medicine students, while physiotherapy students and students of other medical faculties had the least theoretical knowledge about risk factors for urinary incontinence. It is advisable that more emphasis be placed on educating students about stress urinary incontinence due to their insufficient knowledge, in particular for future doctors and physiotherapists who will have direct contact with patients.

Highlights

Stress urinary incontinence worsens living conditions as far as the occupational, social, mental, physical and sexual aspects of a woman’s life
The highest percentage of respondents who mentioned risk factors of this disease was recorded in group Nursing and midwifery (NM)—89%, followed by group M—approximately 82%, group P—approximately 74%, and group Other medical (OM)—approximately 60% (Fig. 1)
In groups NM, P and M, the highest index of indications regarding risk factors of stress urinary incontinence in women was in the category ‘pregnancy and childbirth, and the consequences thereof ’ (Fig. 2) and amounted to 1.04; 0.83; 0.78 respectively

Summary

Introduction

Stress urinary incontinence worsens living conditions as far as the occupational, social, mental, physical and sexual aspects of a woman’s life. Despite its real impact on the everyday lives of millions of women around the world, this problem is still disregarded and treated only as a discomfort associated with personal hygiene. Could this be due to negligence on the part of medical personnel in this matter and perhaps this lack of knowledge and proper information intended for women with stress urinary incontinence? Stress urinary incontinence (SUI) occurs when coughing, sneezing, laughing, or severe physical activity increases intra-abdominal pressure accompanied by involuntary urinary leakage. The first degree is the lightest form of urinary leakage which occurs when there is a significant and sudden increase of pressure inside the abdomen, e.g. when coughing. The third degree is the heaviest form when involuntary urinary leakage occurs almost continuously, even when lying, standing or walking [1,2,3,4,5,6]

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