Family Physician’s Educational Interview with Patients Helps in Early Recognition of Lower Urinary Tract Symptoms

Abstract

Purpose Lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS) can have an etiology outside the lower urinary tract (LUT) and are therefore an important diagnostic indicator for assessing the overall health of a person. However, LUTS is still mainly neglected by primary health care providers as well as by patients. In this study, we assessed the importance of an educational interview (EI) conducted by a GP on the patients’ ability to recognize LUTS. We also investigated other factors that affect the recognition of LUTS: subjects’ personal educational level, number of LUT symptoms and their bothersome level on a scale 0–10. Patients and Methods This cross-sectional study was conducted in Croatia (2018–2020) by interviewing 499 subjects. We compared recognized LUT symptoms before and after the EI and determined whether their number, their bothersome level, or the subjects’ personal educational level were associated with LUTS recognition. Results EI significantly improved the ability to recognize LUTS (p=0.001). The number of LUT symptoms and bothersome level in subjects before EI was much greater than the number in subjects after EI (p<0.0001, mean>4 and p<0.0001, median>8, respectively). Subjects with higher educational level recognized LUTS with fewer symptoms after the EI (p<0.01), but no difference was observed among subjects who recognized LUTS before the EI. Conclusion For subjects to recognize LUTS, their condition had to be severe – more than 4 symptoms and bothersome level >8/10. Personal educational level had little impact on LUTS recognition. However, an EI proved to be an excellent tool for raising awareness about LUTS and its early recognition.

Lower Urinary Tract Symptoms in Depression: A Review

“…This is further amplified when the condition that needs to be addressed is obvious to the patient but not those around them. 51,54,56,70,72,[77][78][79][84][85][86][87][88]93,94,[97][98][99][100]102,103,108,126,[128][129][130] This point is emphasized by the wealth of research on related (disabilities not outwardly visible) forms of disability such as neuropathic pain, MS, depression, myasthenia gravis etc. [91][92][93][94][95][96][97] There is a clear association between LUTS, and depression as addressed earlier, but is depression causing the LUTS, is it the other way around, or is there a confounding factor that we remain unaware of?…”